Increasing ground clearance

I know that there are older threads on this, but am hoping that there are people doing more recent work on this: we live on a funky steep dirt driveway on a funky dirt road in Vermont, and the ONLY thing we are not crazy about with the Leaf is its ground clearance. We raised a Juke some years ago with a 45mm lift kit, which still works very nicely and gives the Juke exactly what was needed- has anyone raised a newer-style Leaf and if so what are the results? Adding 45mm would at least keep it from scraping the ridge in the center of the road..... TIA!

Hey user, what did you end up doing? I'm having trouble with steeper driveways and larger speed humps in our 2019 E+.

My vote/solution is largest cheapest tires that will fit. I'm at 205/65r16 currently. 215/60 or 215/65 might even fit, but haven't found reasonable priced one in those sizes when needing tires.

I reckon I might try that. But would a whole set of tyres be that different cost wise from a 1" lift?

And in terms of drag, does it make a difference if the car is higher by the wheels or the suspension?

The stock tires on our 2020 SV Plus are 215/70/R17

I just lifted mine and put 14" wheels and UTV tires on it. Had to do a little cutting to get the 27" X 9" tires to turn without rubbing the inner fender.

Here's the kit I bought
https://www.ebay.com/itm/3544249527...z2ojgRyRLS&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

To see my build thread look up Monster Leaf in the search.

Sweet.....Nice job. I wonder if it's this easy to do this to a Nissan Ariya. I'd love to have one converted to look like the one used for the recent North Pole to South Pole excursion. I love the look of the "Beast Mode" Ariya.
https://www.topgear.com/car-news/electric/a-nissan-ariya-has-become-first-car-drive-pole-pole

cwiggy said:

I just lifted mine and put 14" wheels and UTV tires on it. Had to do a little cutting to get the 27" X 9" tires to turn without rubbing the inner fender.

Here's the kit I bought
https://www.ebay.com/itm/3544249527...z2ojgRyRLS&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

To see my build thread look up Monster Leaf in the search.

Click to expand...

How much ground clearance did you get?

MillerLF said:

How much ground clearance did you get?

Click to expand...

With the lift kit and tires I got about 3.5 - 4 inches to the body and the front end. The lift kit doesn't raise the rear axle beam so I only got about 1.5 under the rear axle.

TronJockey said:

Sweet.....Nice job. I wonder if it's this easy to do this to a Nissan Ariya. I'd love to have one converted to look like the one used for the recent North Pole to South Pole excursion. I love the look of the "Beast Mode" Ariya.
https://www.topgear.com/car-news/electric/a-nissan-ariya-has-become-first-car-drive-pole-pole

Click to expand...

The important point in the article you linked to is:
"The Ariya apparently used a completely standard powertrain and battery but was modified by Arctic Trucks to accommodate 39-inch BF Goodrich off-road tyres."

The suspension fabricated for this car probably cost as much as a new Ariya.

cwiggy said:

With the lift kit and tires I got about 3.5 - 4 inches to the body and the front end. The lift kit doesn't raise the rear axle beam so I only got about 1.5 under the rear axle.

Click to expand...

Pretty good clearance! Planning to take it to a trail?

MillerLF said:

Pretty good clearance! Planning to take it to a trail?

Click to expand...

Not planning to take it to any public trails. I have a hunting property that I bought a few years ago and decided to pump about $1500 into this instead of spending $8,000 on a lifted golf cart. Seemed like a better use of a vehicle that isn't really worth much as a trade in.

cwiggy said:

Not planning to take it to any public trails. I have a hunting property that I bought a few years ago and decided to pump about $1500 into this instead of spending $8,000 on a lifted golf cart. Seemed like a better use of a vehicle that isn't really worth much as a trade in.

Click to expand...

It would be cool to see that in action!

Drew21 said:

The important point in the article you linked to is:
"The Ariya apparently used a completely standard powertrain and battery but was modified by Arctic Trucks to accommodate 39-inch BF Goodrich off-road tyres."

The suspension fabricated for this car probably cost as much as a new Ariya.

Click to expand...

The article mentions that the suspension remained entirely stock. Absolutely no modifications. Not sure how this was possible but I'll have to take them at their word. They did say that some sheet metal work was necessary as the fenders had to be opened to accommodate the 39 inch wheels. The huge wheel and tire combination likely set them back over $3,000 though.

The article definitely doesn't say that the Ariya suspension remained stock. If you click through the hyperlink for the text "modified by Arctic Trucks" you'll see that "What's new is the jacked-up long travel suspension..."

There are two ways to lift a vehicle. You can do it semi-cheaply, which is fine for all the bro-dozers cruising in town.

If you are doing it for function and durability, it gets expensive. That's when you're talking about modifiying a body-on-frame SUV/truck that has a rugged structure to build upon.

When you start playing around with lifting unibody vehicles, especially for something extreme like wide 39-inch tires, it's going to be very pricey. There's obviously no bolt-on kit you can order, so this was almost certainly custom fabrication. I was probably a bit hyperbolic to say that the suspension might have cost as much as a new Ariya (don't even know how much that is honestly), but this was not a cheap modification.