Hey everyone - I have a 2018 with a 4" lift - running 37" Mickey Thompson Baja's and have about 44k miles on the truck. Tires wore amazingly until right around 40k miles I started getting bouncing on the road and patchy wear. Had a couple shops look at it and said everything was tight and balanced and ultimately they convinced me to get new tires and alignment. Not surprisingly I still have the issue and even with only about 100 miles I'm already seeing the same patchy wear pattern. I'm guessing I need new shocks but wanted some advice. I need to do something quick before I destroy another set of $2k tires! If do need shocks I have no idea how to determine the size I need because of the lift. The truck road a little on the rough side before this compared to non lifted raptors I'm not opposed to upgrading. Any insight or thoughts? Thanks!!
The Raptor is built for high speed off roading and in my experience well engineered by Ford straight out of the box, so why mess with it? I have driven forest service roads in BC, Canada, as well as Baja offroad trails, beaches, and arroyos. The truck is awesome as is, leaving regular trucks and most side by side's in my dust... Previously I was a 2014 Jeep Rubicon owner and built it for rock crawling in Moab. I spent a fortune lifting it, and installing 35" tires - and this was only the start - then I needed a larger brake conversion, heavier duty tire carrier due to weight of 35 spare, gearing changes, stronger axles and so on. In the Jeep world the mantra was "low center of gravity", so my lift was only 2.5" enough to accommodate the 35's. Basic physics dictate the lower the center of gravity, the less chance of rollover. It was fun, but at end of day - i found it dump to crawl over boulders with a $60,000 rig, when i could just as easily drive around them. Then along came these old timer in "stock" war time Jeeps who climbed over same rocks, with no lifts, skinny tires, and no locking differentials... When i sold the Jeep, I did not get a penny more for all the mods (as expected). So are you lifting your Raptor for a specific type of off roading or just for show? Either way, expect to pay $$$. In my opinion the stock Raptor is perfectly fine for the purpose Ford engineered. Yah there are some weaknesses, like the turbo intercooler rads and lighting for high speed night off roading. My 2 cents.
