By now, you all know that there is some funny business going on in the rear of the jeep. Turns out I had to bring the jeep into the hospital for an autopsy.
Based upon the findings in this post there are two paths to take:
Path A: Differential is good, but axles shafts are destroyed-> Upgrade to full floater shafts
Path B: Differential is bad ->Upgrade axle
Here is the jeep in the sick bay, had to bring it in out of the rain.
So first inspection of the differential reveals massive chips in housing, gnarled gears in the torsen differential, shafts seem to be fine. I guess we are going with plan B.
Gotta support the axle when you are pulling it.
Details of the torsen helical-cut gears
These pins seem to be coming out of the holes or something, do not know if that is supposed to happen.
I always was wondering what my gear ratio is, the rear is something like 39/11:1 or 3.54:1
This is a nice pile of metal chunks.
Here is the rear of the jeep awaiting the new axle.
Old axle removed.
I will be swapping a ford 8.8 from a 2002 explorer into the back of the jeep. It has disk brakes, 31 spline shafts and only 40k miles on it. I will also gain at least 4" of track width against the narrow-track AMC20. At the same time I will be installing a locker, doing a spring over, upgrading to YJ springs, re-gearing the front and rear, installing the air compressor, rebuilding/installing the T18 I picked up, and installing a new clutch.
First I am going to rip everything (shafts/center carrier) out of the explorer axle. Then I am going to fit it under the jeep and get it loosely bolted in place for the placement of shock mounts and spring perches. Then I will remove it, weld the perches, weld the axle tubes to the housing, install locker, new gears, reassemble, paint.I will be moving up to 4.56 gears with the hopes of running 35in tires.
Basically I want to work out all the spring-over/YJ spring bugs/tube welding bugs before i rip into the re-gearing of the axles. This way I do not have to weld when I have fresh seals and bearings precisely installed.
I have researched all of the mods I will be making a ridiculous amount. I hope to get away with everything for a reasonable price. I will be fabricating many of the brackets and metal parts that will be used.
Another oder of business is to wipe out the shackle reversal, CJ springs, etc. I was hoping to have some before/after flex numbers, but just know that it sucks now and will be crazy awesome in a few months. I expect to complete the whole project in 2 months time. I am forseeing a due date of March 30th?
Stay tuned.
