swapped out the bad wheel bearing for a junkyard unit. the process went super smooth, which shocked the crap outta me since the suspension has 200k and is more or less rotted in areas. It's not about how rusty your Jeep is, it's all about where the rust is. A huge shout out to Jeep for using some quality bolts to hold the bearings on! The speed sensor didn't fair so well though and a part of it has become a permanent feature of the old bearings. oh well, that system didn't work anyways.
tomorrow I'm hoping to make a run over to a junkyard that supposedly has the front diff I need. we shall see.
oh, and my speedometer stopped functioning for a couple minutes today. good thing I don't use it for anything anyways (got a GPS unit on the dash).