Nice write up Mike. Thanks for the insight. I'm patiently waiting for @JMT's review of the off the shelf Fox's.
All in the name of science
- Thread starter hosejockey61
- Start date
What does the Jeep weigh? According to the truck scale mine is about 4600lbs. And I thought the Ranchos were squishy. Especially when compared to my nicer shocks.
At that weight I can see why. Mine weighs in at 3960 lbs.
Welcome to my world. One of these days I'll give up and just build a 4 link. The balancing act of a three link with trackbar is tedious. I've managed to make it work thus far, even with an 8.8, but everything is tight.
Which goes to show that this one size fits all 5000x recommendation needs to stop.
I think that is true for a variety of shock recommendations. One one hand we have people who recommend the 5000x or 9000xl for everything. Often at the expense of recommending against potentially better shocks such as the OME and Bilstein. I understand the OME and digressive monotubes can be too firm for some people, but some of the heavier Jeeps need the firm valving.
I think Fox is a bit of a different animal, and may even require more caution. My research into Fox has shown that Fox offers a wide variety of tunes depending on whether your talking out of the box from Fox or something from a different manufacturer like Savvy or BDS or JKS or anyone else. My understanding is each manufacturer is getting a proprietary valving. I think the standard Fox valving is pretty generic since they use the same shock for everything from a TJ to an XJ. Even Bilstein and OME design different shocks for different applications. So although I would love to try some Fox, I think getting the proper Fox could be as difficult than choosing between other off the shelf brands. I think any shock recommendation requires some consideration into jeep weight and possibly the springs that are used to support it. As stated, I have no experience with Fox, but I would expect something like Savvy, BDS, or JKS tuned Fox shocks would work better with their springs and any similar TJ/LJ setup than the generic Fox tune.
Wish I could believe that Fox does anything above the ordinary to provide a TJ tuned shock for a stock shock location.
I’m working on it. I can tell you this, it’s a whole different Jeep to drive. Shocks determine ride. I wish I had a set of Bilstein’s to put on there for another comparison, and so I could find more quarters on the road.
I think the first couple hours driving are the most important. After that your buttometer starts to adjust.
I wouldn't expect that at all. All I would expect are three different tunes from three different companies that has little to do with their springs beyond an expected ride height.
Got to ridefox.com and look up the part numbers for a Tj and then go look up the part numbers for an XJ. Fox uses the same shock in both vehicles. There is no tuning done.
Now go to Bilstein and do the same. You will find that Bilstien not only has different part numbers for both vehicles. But they have different part numbers if you have a long arm vs a short arm. I have no idea why a long arm needs different valving than a short arm, maybe weight differences??? I don't know. But whatever Bilstein used during their testing, they determined that long arms and short arms required different valving. If you dig deep enough, Bilstein will tell you the valving on each shock and they are all indeed different from the several I have inquired about. Its not just the part numbers that are different. Bilstein has done some testing and match shocks to vehicles.
Now go to OME. Like Bilstein, you will find that they offer different shocks for each vehicle, as well as different shocks within the vehicle line up depending on vehicle weight and shock selection.
I have no doubt fox makes great shocks, but their TJ shocks are a generic tune.
I thought that at first too. It would have made sense. Especially considering spring weights are within 10lbs of each other. They should carry similar weighted Jeeps in a similar manner. But if you look at the numbers they are different. Not just the part numbers but also the collapsed and extended lengths. But even more obvious. JKS only offers the steel bodied 'Adventure Series'. BDS offers an aluminum bodied Fox.
I do know that Savvy has their own TJ tune. Whether it comes from Fox or they have it done 3rd party, I don't know. I've driven it on a 9" and it is very very different from the generic Fox tune on a 12".
You don't think a shock tuned for a leaf sprung XJ would behave different than a coil spring TJ. Very different vehicles in my book.
Part #'s being the same, a small company like Savvy, or BDS paying Fox to provide different tunes for the TJ? I DO LIKE COOL aid!