I am new to the samurai/ offroading world. I have a stock 87 samurai and would love for it to sit on some 35's. I'm not looking for a hardcore offroading machine, just something that looks cool and will get me up the mountain when it snows. Money is a concern so whatever way is the most cost effective is what i'm looking for. I don't have any experience at all but wanting to learn. Any help is much appreciated! -Josh

I would probably drop back to 33" tires instead of going all the way up to 35" tires.  A set of 33" tires will just fit with a SPOA build with a good set of springs.  I like the Sky Manufacturing Stage One kit since it comes with the cross-over steering and longer brake lines.  You can do it yourself for less but if your new to the modification scene you might be safer going with a know kit as long as you know someone who can weld.

Be aware that you will need to change your transfer case out to get your gearing back.  A 6.5:1 kit from Low Range Off Road or one of the other places should take care of that for you.  You won't be fast but you should be able to hit 60 or so.

The standard 'cheap but large' lift for the Samurai is SPOA and 31" tires.  It looks good, allows you to get into and out of a lot of trouble and won't overtax the stock 1.3 to badly with some good gears in the tcase or differentials.

at the minimum you would have to spoa w/some trimming (search 'virtual lift') and bump stops prevent stuffing

you will want/need to re-gear after this

If you really want to clear 35s do a spoa with the half inch pad spacers, then do a 3 inch body lift and you will be fine!!! But you need to regear the truck a lot if ur gonna 35s

Zak

I'm not too experienced with Samurai's because I spend most of my time with my Jeep Commander on the forums there and there are some great reviews about retread tires from www.treadwright.com I've spoken to many Jeep guys with retreads and they rave about them and they don't go back to buying regular tires. They're extremely cost efficient however...theres a wait list to get these tires sometimes. They have a lot of tread designs like all-terrain and mud-terrain that'll meet your needs. There are 2 options for each tread design, regular and kedge grip. The kedge grip is supposed to help with traction on road but it wears down the tread quicker. The regular have an awesome warranty up to 2 years or 24,000 miles.

If youre on a budget for larger tires this is the best route to go. I'm kicking myself in the butt because I bought brand new Nitto terra grapplers for $575 when I could have gotten way better tires (traction wise) for almost $100 cheaper!! I know next time i'll be buying retreads!!

the cheapest ways have been mentioned; however like Drone stated, once you go bigger than 33, the cheapest is not cheap if you really want to use it.  35s on a samurai takes starts a chain of upgrades thatyou wouldn't need to do on 33s.  Not talking you out of it, but the title of cheap and 35s don't go together.  I would have 35s but with the travel that I currently have the tires would rub the fenders so bad that I was breaking axles and lockers.  so not wanting to re-engineer the complete suspension, I went back to the 33 swampers.  I even cut and raised my fenders and my front pass tire was hitting my battery area of my fender.