G0to60
Observer
My friend bought a Jeep Renegade (non-Trailhawk but AWD) a couple of years ago as a daily driver and to take him up skiing and the occasional Forest Service road. Fast forward to this year and he comes to me with questions about lifts and tires because he's gone to a couple of places where he scraped the underside. After some research by both of us (I knew very little about the little BU chassis) he decided on the Terraflex 1.5" spacer lift, 16" wheels w/ 29" Open Country AT tires. After he had been driving it around for a couple of weeks I invited him on a little trail time at a place call La Dee Flats OHV near Estecada, OR. It's a small area with only 3 trails large enough for 4x4's but they hit all the difficulties from easy to hard. He rode with me in my wife's JKU on the moderate trail to see what was involved and then he hopped in his rig and did the easy trail a couple of times and the moderate trail once. I must admit that little Renegade did pretty well. There was only one time where he got a little stuck and the lack of low range hurt him be we got him on a better line and he bounced right through.
Now I think he's hooked. He got a little damage to the underside plastic on the front bumper and a little bit on the DS front wheel arch plastic. Because of that he's ordered skid plates, rocker guards, a ladder (mainly because it looks cool ? ) and is considering a front bumper. I do feel a little bad now because the day after the trail run something was weird with the steering of his Jeep. Since I helped him with the install of the lift and took him on the trail I feel a bit guilty that I screwed something up or got him into more trouble than he was expecting. It's at a shop right now getting checked out because it was closer to his place than my garage so we'll see. I hope it's nothing serious.
Anyway, here are some pics from his first trail run. I'm in the purple JKU and my Brother-in-law is in the black JKU.
Now I think he's hooked. He got a little damage to the underside plastic on the front bumper and a little bit on the DS front wheel arch plastic. Because of that he's ordered skid plates, rocker guards, a ladder (mainly because it looks cool ? ) and is considering a front bumper. I do feel a little bad now because the day after the trail run something was weird with the steering of his Jeep. Since I helped him with the install of the lift and took him on the trail I feel a bit guilty that I screwed something up or got him into more trouble than he was expecting. It's at a shop right now getting checked out because it was closer to his place than my garage so we'll see. I hope it's nothing serious.
Anyway, here are some pics from his first trail run. I'm in the purple JKU and my Brother-in-law is in the black JKU.