I ordered a Suzuki Escudo lift kit from Novosibirsk, a major city in Siberia.
In that region, there seems to be an abundance of aftermarket parts for four-wheel drive vehicles, and sometimes you can find items that aren’t manufactured domestically.
The set includes front strut upper mount spacers, rear coil spring spacers, and camber correction bolts, allowing for an easy installation with an actual measured lift of 37mm.
The front is installed on the upper mount like this:
The red coil springs were installed as part of a Toyoshima 30mm lift kit prior to this work, resulting in a total lift of 2.5 inches.
For the rear, since we’re installing coil spring spacers, we need to adjust the extension stroke of the shock absorbers due to the structural change. We assembled universal extension brackets to prevent the absorbers from fully extending.
Since we’re significantly modifying the well-balanced stock suspension, issues and strain arise in various areas.
For example, take a look at the rear brake hoses:
When the suspension is fully extended, the hoses aren’t long enough, resulting in excessive bending as shown in the photo. Since this area will be repeatedly strained during driving depending on road conditions, longer brake hoses must be installed.
Regarding alignment, we used the included thin camber correction bolts for the front, and for the rear, we were able to achieve reasonably good camber and toe settings in the static position by adjusting the eccentric cam bolts on the body side of both the toe control rod and lower arm.
With a lift kit, you gain a more aggressive appearance and improved off-road capability, but lose the stock harmony. Extensive adjustment work and ingenuity will be necessary. I expect there will be issues that only become apparent after driving for a while.
When you lift a vehicle, it’s the starting point of tackling the challenge of how and where to rebalance the disrupted equilibrium to minimize problems.
The same applies to lowering. There’s absolutely no way to achieve higher performance than stock with just lowering alone.
