4x4Parts.com 3-inch Suspension Lift:: Nissan 4x4s are kind of the black sheep of the Japanese 4×4 world. Meaning… everybody flocks to the Toyotas, and this ain’t one. So your pool of resources is going to be smaller. Having said that, the companies who DO fly that 4WD Nissan flag, are usually pretty knowledgeable & fanatical about it. 4x4Parts.com is one of those companies… with support & solutions for just about any Nissan 4×4 chassis. 

(CLICK HERE for updated photos of the Pathfinder)

lifted pathfinder

 

4x4Parts.com offers a true 3-inch suspension lift for the Nissan Pathfinder. The kit comes with: 

Upper control arms (w/ poly bushings)   ///   Heavy Duty torsion bars (30% more spring rate)   ///    Idler Arm brace (to strengthen a potential weak link)   ///    Rear 3-inch lift coil springs   ///    Panhard/Trackbar brace (to adjust for the lift)

*You can order the kit WITH or WITHOUT shocks. You can also choose from a couple different shock-options depending on budget. I had already gotten the Rancho RS9000XL shocks from Rock Auto. But you can buy them directly from 4x4Parts.com as part of the lift kit. 

lifted D21 pathfinder**4x4Parts.com gives you the option of doing a 3-inch lift in front with 1.5 lift coils in the rear to ‘level’ the Pathfinder. Or – you can do the full 3-inch lift both front & rear. I went with the 3-inch lift front & rear. It does give the Pathfinder slightly more of a ‘raked’ presence… but I wanted to account for the heavier 33-inch spare that will eventually hang off the back. Plus with 33-inch tires, I need all the rear tire clearance I can get. pathfinder 33s

Even with the full 3-inch lift on this Pathy, I’m still having to cut & trim the truck to fit 33s. I trimmed the plastic fender flares (front & rear) as subtly as possible, rather than just remove them all together. And I have taken a lot of metal out of the FRONT inner fenders. I had to cut off the original bolt-up points for the fenders, so I drilled new holes further back toward the door hinge to make new bolt-up points… allowing for full range of suspension movement & steering angle. The rear (so far) just required a little simple trimming. 

lifted 1987-1995 pathfinder

Alignment is proving to be more of a headache than anticipated. Well – one side is at least. It’s an old-school design that requires adding shims between the upper control arm & chassis to get it within specs. I don’t want to add many shims, since this truck will be banging around off-road and too many shims poses a potential fail-point. So I went back to Mikhail at 4x4Parts.com and ordered their ball joint spacers. You shouldn’t NEED to do this if you use their lift kit, because the new upper control arms are built to the new lifted specs. But the Pathfinder is old, and it’s fair to say that it’s probably been beat on & ramped a few times… so who knows. In any case, the ball joint spacers are a proper way to get the alignment back within specs – should you need them. 

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