Anything is possible with time and money! Can a Pat be raised 4-6 inches, probably. Should it be raised 4-6 inches, probably not. The Pat is so light and i bet a gust of wind would probably flip it over with that big of a lift. That scion looks horrendous btw. To each his own.

 

Anything higher than the RRO 2.125' Lift kit or Stu's coils, will cause your CV axles to wear out very quickly. At the moment 2" is the realistic maximum.

 

That scion only had a body lift so its suspension parts are still low to the ground causing no real improvement on ground clearance

 

Looks like the Scion has solid axles, though. With a solid axle vehicle, all you need is longer springs and bigger tires, more or less, to get the frame further off the ground. But, the axles would still be limited by the tire size as far as clearance. The Patriot has a fully independent suspension. There was a guy with the handle Drillerjoe on here at one time, fabricated his own 3" lift, and told us that's the most he could do without bringing the CV joints out. I'll need a 4-6" lift for my purposes, but that would require custom-fabricated control arms, axles, and tie rods. With an independent suspension, it's tricker to do a lift, but a properly-done lift would increase clearance almost everywhere but the tires.

 

Nope, the Scion in the picture has a stock twist beam axle on the rear wheels (which is dead - it doesn't drive the wheels at all, just keeps them spaced apart). This was typical for FWD cars in the 80's, before IRS became the de facto suspension choice.

The front looks like they just lowered the entire drivetrain using a subframe drop, which would keep all the drive components at about the same height as stock, and just move the body up around them. This probably necessitated an extended steering column, and probably extensions for any wires that went from the engine to the cabin.

There's no reason this same thing couldn't be done with the Patriot. And in fact, it has been done, and when we saw the pics, most people made a collective puke. uke:

 

The whole point of a lift is to be able to increase clearance, the ONLY thing that increases clearance is larger tires. Because the whole things that hold the tires onto the car do not change in clearance to the ground without larger tires.

The largest tire you can reasonably fit on a patriot is a 30". Anything larger and you don't have enough power/correct gearing to make the vehicle drive-able.

There was somebody who put a total 4" lift on their patriot, but it was ridiculous as they did a sub frame drop. That nets you 0 increase in ground clearance, increases your chance of rollover, AND they didn't put larger tires on it, and couldn't put larger tires on it than 30". There is another guy on here who dropped his unibody on a 4runner chassis. but unless you have a spare unibody/truck chassis laying around not really an option.

 

The whole point of a lift is to be able to increase clearance, the ONLY thing that increases clearance is larger tires. Because the whole things that hold the tires onto the car do not change in clearance to the ground without larger tires.

Sub frame lift also gets you better approach, departure and breakover angle all things I'd take. I've been realising more and more that the ground clearance doesn't necessarily mean all that much. Especially since the Pat has a nice flat bottom it can lift your tires right off the ground whereas a frame would dig through or you can sneak a rock underneath.

 

If you know someone really good at math and can run some machines and welders, you can have them remodel your front and rear control arms and other various suspension parts to where the wheels come out and down, sort of like the kind of stuff chopper builders do to frames on their bikes. Doing this will ease some of that kinked effect on the axles while allowing a couple more inches of lift, all the while assisting in keeping your center of gravity at a proportionate level for what you're doing.
Of course, there are downsides to this though...
Have fun locating longer axles that will fit, fabricating extended tie rod ends and sway bars (if you use them), and paying to have all of those welded/fabricated parts x-rayed. If it were an off-road vehicle ONLY, it would be something to consider, but speaking that there are plenty of other vehicles that have so much more potential as an off-road beast, you'd blow through so much more money than what the project is worth, unless, of course, you just want to be the first owner to do something like that. It'd be cool if it were done, but I don't think anyone would want to take on that kind of project...

 

Sub frame drop kit thread:

http://www.jeeppatriot.com/forum/showthread.php?t=146578&page=2

 

Thank you!

 

Still don't know how big_willis found pics...I tried scouring tiger auto's site but could only find one picture of a Patriot with the lift. 4" seems a bit much but I'd consider a 2" and STU's coils if it wouldn't cost more than buying an old XJ or something...

 

I can't see the picture that big_willis posted. They aren't loading for me

 

 

I"d do that to my compass..............I have my back bumper trimmed and my muffler tucked way up, If I could get it done, the hardest part would be finding light weight aggressive tires to stuff in there

 

I'm not going over 28"...still too little torque:icon_rolleyes:

 

I can see your point about not wanting to go above 28' but if you go with relatively light tires you should be ok.

 

My 245/65-17's were really really heavy. I could feel it, but mostly in braking. I probably would next time upgrade my brakes too.

 

Falken Rocky Mountains are a pretty heavy tire though. Not as heavy as BFG Baja A/T's, but heavy enough to take down the MPG's a bit. If Armortracs can be fitted, I seem to recall them being a bit lighter. A few weeks hauling tires around the back of Discount Tire helps a Jeeper know about how much some tires weigh.

 

My 235/65/17 cooper at3 and my 245/65/17 firestone destination at tires are both 34lbs not including wheel weights. Stock sra's are 28lbs with the firestone affinity s something like 22lbs my setup at 34lbs doesn't feel that bad. But when I ran the 40lb 225/75/16 lt tires it was noticeably heavier and sucked the power away. 34lbs seems to be about the sweet spot for decently aggressive tires and weight.

 

Tyler, did you run the 225/75R16 on your Compass? Did you have any fitment issues, rubbing, etc.? I believe this size would be too high a profile for my 2014 FDII and that 225/70R16 would be as tall and as wide as I can go with Cooper Discoverer A/T3s.

 

I'll take all the protection I can get. There's lots of mine tailings around here and I lost a silver dollar sized chunk out of my stock Goodyears. (very surprised I didn't get a flat or have a slow leak) my mounted spare was 62ish lbs so I am on the heavy side.

 

Going from Cooper Discoverer A/T3 215/70R16 (27.72" diameter) to 225/70R16 (28.66") looks to be the best way for me to gain an inch of clearance. Problem is, I just put the 215s on this Fall. I don't think Stu's coils will get me more than one inch of clearance, although I could use stiffer springs in the rear when loaded and pulling a trailer.