Dude, Cherokees have solid front axles!! You don't want anything more than 6". I had a tiny bit over 6" before, now I'm at about 5.5 with my green 99, and want to lower it even more. I think I may be throwing 1 ton full width axles in it though first.....decisions decisions. Here's the 99 with about 5.5-5.75" of lift, long arm front, Bilstein 5150s, alcan rear leafs, Dana 30/Dana 44, 4.88s gears, detroit lockers F/R, Q78 TSLs (35.5" tires), tom woods custom driveshafts, armor, etc...oh, and 4.0L inline 6 and AW4 auto tranny, 231 Tcase, you know
My other XJ is a 96 with 3" of lift, stock gearing (D30/D44), locked rear Dana 44 (disc brakes, all done up, etc) and 32" mud terrains. I should build it up more but it's hard with so many toys and now a house too!! I've not paid much attention to it lately.
Oh, I'm the president of a jeep club, Underground Jeeps. We wheel, a lot, and beat the ever living crap out of our rigs, which is what god put them on earth for...or something, right? Check out
www.undergroundjeeps.net
Do you know what axles it has and what gears it has?? What kind of lift? What year is it? If it's 96+, it's expensive to have it over 3" of lift becasue you need to do a slip yoke eleminator on the Tcase. Earlier years you can get away with more lift without needing it, but still it's a good thing to have. Gears are important. Lockers are essential if you want to wheel. The biggest, best tires in the world wont' get you anywhere if only one of them spins!! Suspension is also important, keeping tires in contact with the ground. Luckily cherokees have a solid front axle, which is ideal for offroading. IFS sux for wheeling, so you're lucky. And the 4.0L and AW4 automatic are both great and virtually indestructable. People swap them into other wheeling rigs they're that good. RIP 4.0L!! Damn emissions standards!
