Bought my first Jeep

Phil_In_The_Blanks

Phil_In_The_Blanks

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Apr 5, 2020
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Los Angeles, CA
Hey everyone,

I recently sold my lowered truck and picked up my first Jeep. Looking to get into off-roading and camping with my dog more often.

The Jeep is great, but I'd like it to be better at cruising down the highway.

I have the three speed automatic what I believe to be 4:56 gears; said by the previous owner. I drive going 65mph according to the GPS, but the speedo reads about 70mph and the motor spins at about 3,000RPM. The tires are 33" tall and I was wondering, from your experience, if getting 35s or 37s would get the RPMs to about 2,500 at 65mph?

I figured I could regear, but I like the idea of bigger tires.

Thanks in advance and I'm looking forward to the Jeep life!

Best regards,

Philip

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Welcome and congrats 🍻

Phil_In_The_Blanks said:
I was wondering, from your experience, if getting 35s or 37s would get the RPMs to about 2,500 at 65mph?
Click to expand...

Going to 35s will only drop your rpms by a few hundred. Going to 35s requires improvements in steering and braking to be done safely/reliably. Regearing will cost you ~$1200. If your concern is running the engine at 3000 rpm, don't worry about it. The 4.0 will run at 3000 rpms without issue.

And 37s? Forgeddaboutit!
 
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If you tweak your steering, suspension and drive angles (if needed), you should find it comfortable to drive. Often tire balance is a huge factor for +60 mph driving pleasure. If the sound of the inline six at 3000 rpms is annoying, maybe the exhaust needs to be refreshed? One of the things I did that yielded the most benefit was to rip out the junk exhaust and replace it with a new stock set up front to back. It lowered my under the hood temperature considerably, helped clear a reoccurring fault code and made my cabin much quieter. The much lower engine bay temperature was a surprise bonus.
 
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Thanks for the Welcome, Chris!

Flivver,

Nothing about the setup now really annoys me. I just don't want to blow up my new baby so I'm overly cautious about the revs being too high for too long. It shifts up at around 4,500rpm with the foot buried so I figured 3k was too high for cruising. The guy that owned the Jeep before me did a lot of work on steering components, rebuilt head, replacement engine accessories and brakes so everything is tip top. It sounds like it's ready for 35s so I'll probably hold off on correcting the speedo until I get 35s on there and I'll not worry about cruising at 2,700rpm at 60mph for the time being 👍🏽

Thanks so much, guys!
 
Nice to find a sled that has been cared for and done right. Lucky even. Lots of my wheeling happens at 3500-4500 rpms. No issue at all. Cruising all day at 3K is no problemo. Red line is not to be feared when all is well in the world.
 
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