pingpong

DC you r ideas are solid. Personally I am cutting away my front bumper, and dooing away with all my inner fender meat, and I am going to build a front cage. I would recommend narrowing your front sheetmetal some, and moving your headlights inboard some to give you more room for tires, and so you can improve your approach angle. The way my cage was built was mocked up on Pong, then removed and welded, then set back down ontop of the rock rails. Made for some good welds.

There was a big writeup on a local board, it has nothing to do with the owners of the park. The ppl who auctually own the land want to sell it, and since it is private land, there isnt much we as wheelers can do about it, unless we pool our money and buy up the whole piece of land

You have definately thought this out. You are 100% correct about the weld only being as strong as the host metal. Wew had a guy named Sam in our club rip a chunk out of his rear d60. I guess he didnt figure the stress out right on his rear trac bar, and it literally ripped a piece out of his axle. I say build it, and then tell us if it was cheaper, and then wheel it and tell us your overall impression

First time I wheeled Pong.... I called her to tell her of the body mods she was pissed, I got home and she said "it don't look that bad" I was cool I am in the clear.... I went and washed it, and she said " can you put the mud back" and that started the down hill spiral for Pong

Ring gear bolts are only suppose to be used 1 time, they stretch when torqued.... is it OK to re-use them... I suppose, make sure you use lock tight. The bearing cap thing is super important

Just swap in a solid passenger side axle shaft. As for the bed chopping..... everyone knows beds are overrated :nanner: Search the build section and you will see some tasteful ways of shortening your bed with out going full truggy.... I say chop it, tube it, wheel it.... then rebuild it :driving:

It is.. if you have the tools.... RH and LH taps, and the right size DOM, and you can make your own... expect to pay a pretty penny for the LH tap, but if you make say 3 or 4 steering setups.... it would be worth it, or you can buy tubing adapters, and weld them in, and be beefy as hell

With either setup expect driveshaft clearance issue, or starter clearance issues. A couple of the guys in the club running 350/350 D300 combos had to have special driveshafts made to clear the trans pan, and even then they had to do some ginding. The HP 60 is a great idea, but I have heard ppl have probs with exhaust clearance with uptravel

You can get them from just about anywhere that sells the Lock right should sell the crosspin, most of the times they include it with the purchase, and for the ring gear bolts I think you can get them from any ring and gear vendor.

main advantage to OVT is more clearance.... you are less likely to bend it when it is higher up, but you can run into issues with clearance on your trac bar, and sway bar mounts

My wifey hates it... I spend to much time, money on something that she won't ride in.... then I nought her a Jeep, she didnt like it, so I bought her another one, and she don't like it either, so now I have 3 jeeps, alll with varios mods, and an unhappy wife, so its all good :D

Replace your ring gear bolts, and re-install. also replace your cross pin with one of those high strength ones. Also use redloc tite on the ring gear bolts

They aren't the best pics, but you get the idea, I will try and find the part numbers for them, or you can do a search on pirate, or a ford bronco site, cause that is where the idea came from

I have to agree with CW.. everyone wheels different. That TNT truss looks decent for the price.... I know where to d44's like that are, problem is.. they have drum outers which means converting to disc (which is easy) which means more money. To answer your question why someone would swap 1/2 ton stuff on a 3/4 tom knuckle.... its simple to convert to 5 lug or 6 lug, and to run the rim size or tire size you have. You can buy complete dodge and gm axles cheap, and just swap in the outers.

It won't make any difference, unless you have really sensitive ears. As stated above you will only hear the ratcheting sound, associated with this type of lockers

Expect to pay a lil more then 85, at least around here, to have your shaft re-tubed is 140 including balancing.

RUN from it.... make you a setup like I have on casper, and buy the Goferit set up, and do it on the cheap using 1 ton tre's. The problem with Hiems in general is they don't hold up very well in a dirty enviroment. They tend to wear out quick. If you can't find a pic of Casper on here I think I might have one, just search some of my Post to see how the setup is on it

I am getting ready to install one on my rig. I am going to be using a NP203 to d300. Here is the site I will be getting it from http://www.offroadoverstock.com/store.c ... =46&afid=& I do agree with you that the np203 to np205 would weigh way too much, for what would amount to a 4 to 1 kit just with other choices. With the d300 I will have a 1.96 to 1, a 2.62 to 1 and then a 5.13 to 1, and always would have the option of installing a 4to 1 in the d300 for an insane 7.84 to 1, just a lil food for though, I hope I did my math right too :smart: As for which is better.. from what I have read... the Mad roosters kit is more money, more work, and pretty much the same thing... do a search on pirate, and decide for yourself after talking to some ppl As for buying a Stak or a 3spd atlas.... they are nice, but expensive. Right now I have 36 bucks tied up in my setup, I still have to buy the doubler kit, but ppl throw away np203's, thats how I got mine, and d300 can be had for free ( how much mine was) or for as lil as a couple hundred bucks, throw in the cash for the 32 spline outputs, and you are at the same strength as anAtlas, just for less money. By the way.. there was a flipped 300 for sale on Pirate, from a local club member for like 650, the only thing you would have to do is install it... much cheaper then 2500 :brows: Also your build plan rocks... mine is going along the same lines as yours, but I am doing the GM axles D60 and 14 ff, with a vortec 4.3 turbo 350, np203 d300. On 42 IROKS on H1's.. I all ready had the truggy thing going ;)

I had the same thing happen on a XJ yrs ago... but some how the wire got inbetween the shoe and the drum.... it sucked.. so I sold the jeep, it would have costed more to fix then the jeep was worth to me

If you rock crawl the d30 is on borrowed time on anything bigger then 33's if you are locked, or running anything larger then a 12.5" tire. As DC pointed out, there are lots of strength issues to be ovecome. I thought I would be good once I went chromo shafts.... I got 4 runs out of them before I broke the shaft off in the splines... Talk about sucking.. I had to disaasemble my whole front end to pull out about 2" of 4340 so I could run a stock shaft the second day and have just as much fun :eek: before that broke as well, and I had to winch 400yds up hill :headpop: If you truss your axle like the jeep speed ppl do, you might as well run 33's cause thats how much ground clearance you will have, and if you truss the top, you will lose up travel, or put holes in your owl pan by upflexing the truss into it.... ask how many ppl running the Sky jacker Rock ready kit if they have a straight oilo pan :brows: As for the ford axles, there is nothing wrong with the ford f150 d44, even with the cast c's They are still stronger then a built d30 in stock form, and with all the bronco aftermarket out there you can adapt them pretty easily to a jeep. I even saw a radias arm kit that lengthens them 12" and puts a flex joint on it, all you do is weld it up. then you can run a ford 9" or 8.8 which is just as if not stronger then the front axle, and beats the piss out of a d35. F250 axles are special, they use d60 brake calipers and require they use of 16" or bigger rims, they also have special inners that do not adapt to other d44's. But if you want a mathcing set of these complete with front springs and driveshaft let me know.... I have one sitting behind my garage as well as the matching d60

I now see how you are going to mount it, and think It could possibly work. How much flex will these give your axle, and how much misalignment can they take? What about the affects of flexing your axle?

I finally recieved all my stuff from Ballastic fab... I am somewhat happy with the products, but they took tooo long to get. I also recieved my Mag run flats today as well. I am hoping to start moking the front end this weekend if it doesnt gt to cold.

Eagle You are 100% correct about the AAl and shackle difference. But he said he wanted a way to do a small lift. That is probrable the easiest and cheapest way to get 2".. is the best... hell no, but does it flex.... Oh Hell yeah

Bend tech pro is a program to help design cages... I am not sure if it can simulate forces on a cage or not.

I would use coil spacers up front and 2" drop shackles from a chevy