4 inch lift + soa | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

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4 inch lift + soa

Barrows80

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November 23, 2018
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City, State
Malin, OR
Year, Model & Trim Level
94 Explorer xlt
I was wondering if anyone has ever done a 4 inch lift kit and a soa together? If so what lift coils did you use? More than likely you'd have to do sas. I know you can do a sloped body lift but I don't wanna go that route.
 



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I'm also interested as I'm about to lift my '92.
From what I understand, SOA will add 5", so you'll need to lift the 4" lift to level it out.

My plan is 5.5" with SOA and extended radius arms. Just gotta figure out which is best without going broke LOL.
 






I did a SOA with 64” GM springs to bring up the rear, it ended up with 6” of lift.
The front I did a cut n turn to avoid drop brackets. I used some stiff XJ lift coils and spacers to get height. The XJ coils (240#/inch) are way too soft and have settled out. From what I’ve read you want coils in the 400#/inch range of rate.
 






Well I just had to look that up, because I come from a solid axle world, and didn't realize you could do that with TTB :)

Ford Ranger Dana 35 TTB Cut And Turn - Why & How

Seems that is a better way to go, but I certainly wouldn't be confident in cutting my beams....well not without having some spares to hand.

For me and my mild wheeling I think a Skyjacker / James Duff lift would be the best compromise.
 






Thanks guys. But more what I was wondering is 4 inch lift leaf springs plus soa as well if anyone would know about that ?
 






That would net 9-10" of lift
 






That would net 9-10" of lift

Why do you think you need that much lift? I ran SOA with the stock springs for years with 35" tires. If you have that much in the rear, cut and turned beams will only get you half that up front, so you would have to run drop brackets as well. It will also make it very unstable.
 






SOA gives good height. I rally mine pretty hard and its still stable. I'm no BJ Baldwin, but I do like sliding corners and skid roads and climbing stuff.
 






It also moves the shocks up out of harm's way. I remember when I had the SUA and would scrape the dial off of my Rancho 9000 shocks on a regular basis. With a SOA, you should be able to run 35" tires. They might rub on the front edge of the fender, but that is easily remedied by pushing the edge in a little.

If you are going to SOA the rear only, then you would need 5-6" of front suspension lift to level it out. With all the modifications over the years to my Explorer, I really have no idea how much lift it has. I think the rear is around 6" higher than stock, front is probably 8-10" with the SAS.

I have had several suspension configurations over the past 24 years owning the Explorer;
Rancho 2.5" lift
Superlift 4" SUA
Superlift 5.5 SOA
Mixed parts 5.5"-ish with the Superlift Superrunner steering
Current is Franken leafs made from 2 sets of Explorer springs to get the height I wanted, with dual shocks to help with body roll. Rear is still set up this way. Its a little stiff and I am planning on a custom leaf pack from National Spring in the near future.
Front is SAS HP D44 with 14" coil over shocks and Duff radius arms.
If I had to do it all over again, I would have skipped right to the SAS and SOA. The SAS is super stable in the twisty stuff, and with the coil over shocks and Duff arms, I feel it will run with most TTB's at speed.
 






Long arms make a huge difference in the ride.
 






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