KYB vs Monroe vs ??? For Jeep WK

I figured with limited time to work on my daily driver Grand Cherokee, I'd see about having a local shop with a good reputation check it out and give me an estimate. 

The items I was concerned with were the oil leak that seemed to be from the oil pan and what sounded like an exhaust manifold leak. I also had a pair of stabilizer link I hadn't gotten around to installing even though I bought them 6 month ago. 
 

Well the findings were:

oil leak: oil pan gasket, rear main, and trans pan are leaking

exhaust leak: no exhaust it's leak found, it's a lifter making the noise (hmm Hemi tick?)

Stabilizer links: they didn't install them, but said the right shock/strut was blown, lower ball joints were bad and uppers should be replaced while they are in there. 

Grand total for oil pan gasket, trans gasket, and front end work $3900!

Luckily I had sat down before he gave me the number, and I just had them do the oil change and charge me for the diagnostic services ($225 total).

When they called back to say it was ready, they also provided an estimate just the front end work, I don't remember if it was $2300 or $2600 because my brain tuned out once it was over $2k. I paid over the phone and picked it up after work with the spare. 

So now i need to figure out next steps for a 2007 GC limited with 155k miles. Which just coincidentally needed a new battery today. 

After looking at new car prices I've settled on a plan to do place an order with RA for a pair of quick struts (not really strut front end, but that the easiest way to describe them), ball joints, rear shocks, and a transmission pan gasket and celebrate Labor Day by working on the jeep. I'll live with the lifter noise for now and see if it gets worse, maybe even do an oil analysis to see if there's iron showing up from the lifter is the failure is a seized roller. 
 

Now for the TL:DR:

KYB excel g front shock/strut assemblies or Monroe?

Rear shocks will be KYB.

Any thoughts on the lifter noise?

here the link to RA shock/strut assembly options

My experience with KYB is that you're buying and installing brand new worn out struts.

Any other experience with different options that might be worth getting?

Doesn't need to be from RA, but the use case is NE roads with pothole, frost heaves, and occasional light off road exploring. 

I see RA has Bilstein, but only as separate pieces.
 

Is the ride enough of an improvement to do go through the trouble of moving my springs over? Or ordering new springs?

Tire Rack shows currently out of stock, but for $20 more per corner you could have Konis, maybe another seller has them in stock at the moment:

https://www.tirerack.com/suspension/results.jsp?autoMake=Jeep&autoModel=Grand+Cherokee+Limited&autoYear=2007&autoModClar=

and I agree with Parker, when you shop bottom of the barrel, don't be surprised when that's what you get (in terms of performance, durability, parts life, etc.).  If you just needed a repair to last you a year or get the car traded in somewhere, I get KYB/Monroe.  If you're going to keep this for any length of time, a small cost now ($100-200) for better parts will likely stand you in good stead.  The labor cost is the same, right?

In reply to Flynlow (FS) :

I'm fine with paying a bit more to get a better quality part, especially since I've had a bit of time to get over the "I don't want to work on my daily", and decided I'm going to keep it around for my younger son to take over when he gets his license in 2.5-3 years.

How do the Konis compare to Bilstein 4600 or Rancho 5000x?

I figure I'll do all 4 corners with a matched set. 

Sample size = 1, so take it fwiw, but I once installed a set of "sporty" KYBs and the ride was atrocious. I suspect they just cranked the E36 M3 out of the compression damping to make the discomfort feel like "performance." They were cheap. I don't feel like it was worth whatever money I saved, and I won't buy them again.

In reply to No Time :

I don't know, unfortunately.  Most of my experience is on cars.  When it comes to BMWs, Subarus, and a few others, my experience is (non-Yellow) Konis tend to ride a little bit nicer than Bilsteins.  Bilsteins tend to be a little harsher on initial impact/compression, Konis tend to let the suspension move more.  But that's just my opinion.  Lots of BMW guys swear by Bilstein.  The Koni FSDs (Frequency Specific Damping? or whatever they call them now) are my go-to for daily driver. 

My experience is the same. Bilsteins give a busy ride, Konis are more settled. I even pulled a set of Billies off my Vanagon to replace them with Koni, and Janel wants me to pull the Bilsteins from her WJ Grand Cherokee and put on some Foxes. 

BTW, FSD has been renamed Koni Special Active. The Koni summer sale goes until the end of this month.

Looking at the options for Konis, it seems like the choices are "heavy track " and "special active", anyone have experience with both to compare the difference?
 

There's a small cost difference but not unacceptable pricing for either one. 
 

here's a link that has some more info, but not definitive:

Koni description
 

I'm not as familiar with the Heavy Track, but I read that as the Special Active being the "mostly pavement" option and the HT being the "mostly not pavement" choice. 

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Thank for looking at differences.

I wasn't sure if the HT would be better for the weight and durability, but I think it safe to assume Koni has taken the vehicle weight and factory tire size into account with both options. 

Since my use case is mostly road, and any off-road will be low speed, the SA is probably the best option  

One more question that came to mind. 

I need to check, but supposedly the ball joints are loose and I'm not sure when they were last replaced, so I may do all 4 if any are loose so I won't be doing any for a while. 

If I'm going with Koni, should I spend a bit more and replace the control arms to get all new ball joints and bushings? At 155k I suspect some of the benefit from new shocks/struts will be lost to worn bushings. 

New bushings do wonders for making a car feel new again.