
I’ve taken the summer off from updating this build thread. I figure, why spend time on the computer when you can spend time on the trails? This was my first summer season with the montero and it was great to see all the hard work and time pay off! Here is how to Montero is currently sitting
As hinted about before, lift and tires are on. I’ve actually had them for about 5,000 miles and 2 months at this point. I went with a 285/75/16 BFG Ko2 all terrains, and I couldn’t be happier! The are aggressive enough for all the trails i end up on and they handle the highway like a true street tire. The side way is much stronger than my previous Goodyear wranglers.
It seems that not matter how many times the topic is brought up, people still want to know about how the Gen 3 will handle 33’s (myself included). The short story is: it does awesome. You definitely feel the loss of power on the hwy. My speedo runs about 5mph lower than stock and i spend less time in the higher rpms (which is where the power band is on these 3.8L engines). Around town it’s less noticeable. Acceleration feels just a touch sluggish but within a week I had completely adjusted to it. Braking time is increased and less effective, but not unbearable or unsafe. Off Road (dirt or gravel) in 2H, 4H or 4HCL it feels really sluggish. I'm pushing the accelerator nearly to the floor before it downshifts and gives the power I need to maintain normal driving speeds. 4LCL is a different story. 4LCL is still punchy, powerful and torquey. It still crawls up and down everything with ease. I’ve never been lacking for power in 4LCL. However, the different tire size does seem to confuse the transmission shift points. For example, the transmission likes to stay in 3rd gear at nearly any speed offroad in 4LCL.. Which is absurd. This puts the rpms down in the 1,500 -2,000 range which is barely above idle. I often downshift manually into 1st or 2nd off road and that fixes the problem.


What about Gas mileage? Well. If you bought a montero for the MGPs then you messed up haha. When mine was stock I saw close to window sticker numbers. Somewhere between 15 and 19 mpg with mixed driving conditions. Now that i’m on a much heavier 33” tire i’m seeing closer to 12-15 in normal driving and 10mpg offroad. It’s pretty bad. This isn’t a huge problem for me because i live in a small town and bike to work. So I only really use the Montero for trips and adventures.. And that’s the price you pay to play with an offroad rig.
Fitment:
Rumor has it that 285/75/16s can fit on a gen 3 with stock suspension with just a little bit of trimming of the plastic bumper. I bet this is true given how big the wheel wells are. However, I opted to do a cheap spacer lift to get me through this summer. Everything i do to this truck is on a tight budget, so while i’d like to just swipe my card and build it, i have to wait and time my mods and upgrades accordingly with my budget and time constraints. I will be making a separate post with details about spacer lift options and their different outcomes. It was a mess to get this the way i wanted, but in the end I ended up with something that works really well, is safe and cost effective.

The lift I ended up with is a 1.5” spacer lift front a rear. I used some rubber pucks for the rear and aluminum discs for the front. I got the rear ones from a fellow montero owner and have no idea where they came from. They are just ok. I will be replacing them over this upcoming winter for better weight support and a little more height. I will be going with OME medium duty springs without any spacers. The fronts were home made. I cut some aluminum discs 6” in diameter and ½” thick. These slipped right on top of the stock strut mount. This safely lifted the front up 1.5 inches. The difference in spacer thickness and lift height is due to the geometry of the IFS. A little bit goes a long ways. With these spacers the CVs sit almost flat so angles were not an issue.




Wheels:
I did attempt to get a cheap set of steel wheels for the new tires. I want a 0 offset, but the brake calipers in the front make it hard to fit some kinds of cheap wheels. So i decided to hold off on wheels until i can spend the money and do it right. Hopefully that will happen soon because wow is this thing narrow and tippy offroad. At least it has amazing balance and a lower center of gravity.
With the lift on my next order of business was to handle the slider kick outs. I scored on some left over steel that was already bent to the perfect angle and size for my kick outs. This was kinda a quick and dirty job. I eyeballed the fitment, cut the ends down, tacked it, welded it and gave it a rattle can finish. Nothing pretty, but they did save my doors 2 or 3 times this summer. Before next season I will go back and put some additional supports in the middle for increased rigidity and hopefully the ability to use a Hi lift jack on them.

After spending a whole summer on the spacer lift i learned a lot about the handling and suspension upgrade needs. The weakest link is saggy springs and bouncy shocks in the rear (but I ended up doing all 4). On the highway it swayed a lot and likes to wonder after bumps. I already want to replace the springs, but figured i would start with shocks first for better performance sooner. I polled the montero community and decided on Bilstein 4600s. Fronts are Bilstein 24-062718 and rears are 24-062725.
I should have done this upgrade much sooner but didn’t know how bad it really was. I have no record of the struts or shocks being changed in the history of the truck. Upon removing the rear shocks i discovered that they offered almost no dampening at all. I was able to compress one of them with one finger and it would not bounce back. This means I spent the summer wheeling around and road tripping with basically no shocks and just stock springs in the rear. Epic fail. Since the rears were so bad I bit the bullet and did the front ones too. They weren’t as bad but definitely had seen some wear.
Rears



Front


So now I have new struts in the front and shocks in the rear…. And it rides like a dream! All the vagueness and body roll I was used to disappear and instead the truck is planted, smooth and stable. The highway is no longer a death trap and offroad it just eats up the bumps and rocks. This might be my favorite upgrade after the 33” KO2s
An interesting point on the rear Bilsteins. When I installed the new shocks I noticed that they were slightly (½”) shorter than the stock ones I was removing. I was nervous about having the shock be the limiting factor for my droop. I called Bilstein and they confirmed that I had the right part, and that it was the correct measurement from the factory. So I put my fears to rest since I figured they would know what they are doing and that they would know if it had resulted in major problems. Plus they are covered by Bilsteins lifetime warranty.
