- First Name
- Larry
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2024
- Threads
- 2
- Messages
- 1,180
- Reaction score
- 1,520
- Location
- Santa Clarita, CA
- Vehicle(s)
- 2024 Maverick Lariat FX4 4K tow
- Engine
- 2.0L EcoBoost
I’m seeing a bunch of comments in this thread that just don’t jive with my maverick experience, or actual data presented in this forum. For example, if you look at the poll of people who have actually broken axles / CV joint failures, 77.3% of forum members reporting failures were running stock height mavericks and 22.7% were lifted. And 77% of the failures happened in FWD hybrids. That doesn’t tell me that lift is causing CV failures, it’s tells me that any driving causes CV failures, ie. they have a design flaw. Does a 2” lift lead to CV failure because of extreme cv angles? It doesn’t in any other other IFS 4x4’s that we’ve seen on the market in the last 40 years. 1” is considered safe, 2” is the upper end of safe. And 3” is starting to get into the risky zone. I also disagree with the on-roaders in this forum that claim you shouldn’t be off-roading the maverick. The maverick is perfect for rutted up fire roads. I agree that you shouldn’t be going to All-Trails looking for black diamond OHV trails to take the maverick on or running through rock gardens that are set up as obstacles and have by-passes around them. But the maverick has some inherent advantages like light weight, better economy and an overall width that is 1” narrower than a Jeep Wrangler. I have an FX4 with 4K tow package. Because of 2k towing, the tremor was not an option for me. All stock, I was at 8” clearance at the muffler, 8.5” at the left and right felt belly skid plates and 9” at the front metal skid plate. After putting 255/65R17 Falken AT4’s on it, I was at 8.5” at the muffler, 9” at the belly skids and 9.5” at the front skid. Then I put a $120 Rough Country spacer lift on it, plus another $500 for installation and 4 wheel alignment. After the lift, I’m at 10” at the muffler, 10.5 inches at the belly skids and 11” at the front skid. So a “2 inch lift” really only gave me 1.5” in the front and rear. So with the 255/65 tires and no lift, I never had any tire rub with light off-roading. Now that I have lifted it, I took it on the Sierra Pelona OHV trail and parts of the Rohwer OHV trail that is black diamond rated. Still no tire rubbing. And yes, I bypassed the hard sections on the black diamond trail. I used to own a JK rubicon 2 door with 37”s and I have a pretty good idea of what is possible without lockers and what obstacles are going to be impassible without lockers. So on some sections, I was like nope, don’t want to get sideways on that from excess tire slippage and roll-over down the slope. Check the Google images for Rowher OHV trail. Plenty of pics of rolled Jeeps. So how did the maverick do? It did surprisingly well. I was able to climb some uneven, rocky slopes with a coating of loose sand at angles of up to 15 degrees (27% slope) and I was able to make it to the top of forest route n607, climbing from 2,000 feet elevation up to 4,820 feet and back down in 3.5 hours of crawling, mostly at 5 mph, sometimes 10 mph and rarely 15 mph. Would I have went any faster than that if I had a full suspension lift instead of a spacer lift? Nope. I didn’t want to puncture anything in my underbelly. And about climbing ledges, a key metric for a fire trail rig trying to climb out of ruts, I was able to climb 10 inch ledges straight on and up to 16 inches (visual estimate) by hitting them at a diagonal and turning my front tire into the slope. It’s not “Jeep like”, but it is pretty darn impressive and it is perfect for where I want to go, what type of trails I want to be on and how much risk I want to take at this stage in my life. I did The Rubicon and Moab in my JK Rubicon in early middle age. Now in late middle age, I no longer want to take those risks and end up wrenching on my broken rig in the middle of the trail, after the sun has went down. No thanks, not anymore. The maverick is perfect for what I want to do.
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