Update post:
Alright folks! New shocks and coils went on the front today. I was a little over-optimistic thinking we could do the front and rear the same day.
We started by removing the old coils and shock, then cycled the suspension with the mew shocks so we could set bump-stop length. I worried a lot about this step but it was actually pretty painless. I bought
these jounces off Amazon and straight up just cut them to size with a reciprocating saw.
The hard part was getting off the old coils and putting on the new with my over-sized
spring compressor. It just didn't really fit quite right around the knuckle. On the bright side this one is much safer than the brackets I saw most people using on YouTube to compress the coils.
The SHOCKing part was seeing just how much longer the old coils are compared to the new ones. Sadly the
JKS coils I put on didn't quite achieve the 2" lift I was looking for, but I can live with it until I can buy new coils some time. My up travel is limited to about 3.5" which is bad, but I'm not really building out the jeep to rock crawl or do anything more than moderate trails so I think I'll survive until I can buy the right coils to add another inch of height and get my uptravel to 4.5" which is a much better place to be.
The ride home from my brother's place felt amazing. The Ranchos in the front make an incredible difference. The jeep rides SOOOOO much better now. Can't wait to do the rears later this week.
Big thanks to everyone on the thread who helped me think through the challenges and prepare.