Currently I am SUA with 4" leaf, 1" shackle, and 1" body lift. The front is a High Pinion Dana 60. Steering is an inverted T, stock YJ pitman arm, and a flipped tie-rod on a HP dana 60.The issues I am having is that my tie rod makes contact with my pitman arm & draglink TRE mount. They are right over each other with only 0.5 - 1" of space with the Jeep parked on level pavement.

To solve my steering problems, I am leaning towards a Chevy Astrovan, Cj, Wagoneer, or WJ pitman arm to fix the clearance problem between the tie-rod and drag link TRE - Pitman arm mount since it does not have a 2" drop like the stock YJ and also pushes the draglink TRE and pitman mount .75" back. Then I was thinking about mounting the drag link to the tie-rod from behind and having the castle nut up front rather then mounting from the front and having the castle nut behind the tie-rod. This will allow more clearance since the axles move forward during compression. The only down side is that I will have to remove my anti-sway bar on this street driven Jeep.

I looked at switching to High-Steer and running the tie-rod behind the Axle and drag lik up front while still SUA. The problem is that the pumpkin stuffs nicely between the frame rail and the pan resulting in a clearance problem with the pan and tie-rod if mounted behind the axle.

I can go SOA and my steering problem will go away because the tie-rod and pitman arm spacing will be much greater. My knuckles are already machined and tapped for Dana 44 high steer arms and the pumpkin has already been shaved and two holes tapped for mounting the spring near the pumpkin for a SOA application. I can leave the tie-rod in the same location or relocate it with the drag link mount to high steer arms on the knuckle The problem is that I am not ready to buy new springs, tires, arms, and other costs that a SOA will cost.

New Pitman Arm Options:

Stock YJ Pitman Arm is 5.5” with 2” drop

Chevy Astrovan are 6.25” dead flat pitman arm with the Saginaw spline and has the GM DLE reamed into it stock

1970’s Chevy Camaro dead flat pitman arm with the Saginaw spline

1970’s monte carlo is short

Jeep Cherokee WJ is nearly flat, stout as hell and is longer than the others which will give you more throw.

Wagoneer – 6.25” and uses the same TRE as Chevy Axles

Cj’s are 7” eye to eye and flat

ZJ pitman is 1” lower then a XJ

Mid 90’s Pontiac FS car which is 1” shorter than the waggy arm


Please add or correct this list in you have further information or other options.

Staying SUA with my lift and running Dana 60 is a tight fit. Even if I just fix the steering with a new pitman arm the up travel in the suspension is going to be limited. Next year I plan to go SOA in the front but for now I want to get out and wheel with limited costs to get the Jeep back on the road.

How much up travel would be too little. Right now it looks like if I go the route of replacing the pitman arm with one that is flat, will result in setting up my bump stops to limit the upward travel to 2.5" to 3". Is this ok?

Why not go to a high steer setup with your current SUA configuration? You would need to add an arm and build a new draglink. Use one-ton TRE's for the new draglink and ream your pitman arm out larger from the top. It gets the draglink high and out of the way of everything; on my CJ it was also dead parrellal, resulting in 0 bumpsteer.

I would have to get two high steer arms for both driver and passanger side knuckles. If I just move the drag link to the passanger side knuckles then the tie-rod will still contact the pitman arm.

I know there is a reason why I can not run the drag link and tie-rod on high steer arms up front with not much of a lift. I want to say it will hit the frame rails or the power steering box but I will have to crawl uder my jeep tonight to remind myself.