brian

I know you are all on pins and needles wondering how my life w/ jeep is going ;) I've got a few calls in to see who has a rear end for me. So far looks like there may be one about 2 hous from here. I asked them to verify the gears in it ..no call back yet. I can't see taking the advice some of you gave as to upgrading.While I appreciate all the good advice.. Why would I want to tear out the front axle too when all I want is to get my jeep back on the road? :dunno: I rarely use the 4 wheel drive unless I'm on the beach. I guess some/ most of youse guys are into off roading in a big way and need the heartier gears. I would rather spend the time it takes to do all that work at my local watering hole :cheers:

Lots o' good, reasonable advice. Thanks all. to bigalpha; my jeep has part time awheel , or so the dash light indicates. :dunno: now I'm wondering if there was damage to the tranny. My kid says when this 1st happened the engine shut down .When he re-started it it lugged down and died again. So he put it in 4low and drove forward for a while (in the sand). Sounds to me like the busted gears had the rear end siezed up until he forced the truck forward with 4wheel dr. Then the gears got broken into many small pieces and the rear end rolled freely.sort of. A strain like that would surely play hell with the tranny. :( I guess I'll look into that . meanwhile I gotta find a rear end with 3.07 gears and from an mj still gonna let the kid pay for it. :fool: Brian

no ,he put it in four wheel drive and drove part way home with the front end doing all the work while the rear chattered and banged. Finally he pulled over and called the old man to come tow him. thank god my wife has AAA brian

Ha aha. there was no girl involved he was surfing and confessed he was cutting cookies on the beach with the jeep when it broke so I' not so inclined to let him off completely Brian

ok you bunch of old dogs I just crawled out from under the front end. the tag on the front housing which looks to be untouched by human hands says 3.07 just like you all figured. So untill I can piece together the busted pinion gears and do a count I'm leaning toward the theory that someone replaced the rear end with a 3.55 while the front end is a 3.07. This also explains why the rear brake control valve(bias) was hooked up wrong when I bought the rig. What an education I'm getting! Now what do I tell my son?? :oops: Let's see...allow him to continue feeling bad orgive him a break / brian

sorry I posted that last one not realizing there were 3 pages of posts already. I only read the 1st two. ok I'm gonna find the tag on the fron axle and also count the teeth on the rear although the pinion gears are in pieces so counting may be tough. I'm wondering how this ends myself! 'for those of you wondering why I'm so dense...too many things on my mind. I hadn't thought this through and i've never even opend up a diferential before.All those teeth! scary! brian

first of all to the last poster; I can't turn my wheel to count driveshaft revolutions since the gears are busted and the drive no longer engages. Good idea though. I'm thinkin' maybe the front gears don't match the rear as was suggested.And yeah, sure that could cause something to snap. So now that I have access to this site and some of you can read the codes stamped on the housing tags, I'll get the numbers from my front axle tag. If this wasn't my kids fault but was a result of some dumbass previous owner :fs2: putting in the wrong rear end...well....hmmmm, I think I'll still let the boy pay for the new one. What's he got to spend his money on anyway? I'll be back with those numbers. brian

Okay I pulled the cover ..don't see anything stamped on the ring gear but the tag on the exterior has numbers that I can read just barely. anyone know what these indicate? 895 3004682 3 55 605324-5 I assume the 89 in the top line indicates year1989 and 3 55 in the bottom line means it is a 3.55 gear ratio? Is that all I need to know? :dunno: Yes craigslist has a couple w/in 100 miles though I need to verify they are suitable for swap.And I have a call in to the local junkyard brian

Ha ha! Just so you know..The kid got a dope slap and a major lecture on 'maning up.' He is paying for this new rear end from his bank account. if I can find one. Actually he feels pretty bad about the whole thing and all the repairs over the years are turning him into a pretty good backyard mechanic. btw I feel I should explain my fear of gears; you see ,when I was in the womb, my pregnant mother was frightened by a 10 speed bicycle! brian

YIKES! lots of opinions! I'll look at the tag on the rear end and also the stamped numbers on the gear. Thanks for the formula for determining which gears I have from those numbers. As soon as I can force myself under the truck I'l llok at those things. Also, I wasn't thinking that there would be a problem with the front axle gears matching the rear. Thank you for that little tidbit. probably dodged a bullit there! I live on the oregon coast directly east of Portland. Few choices for wrecking yards here.That's why I thought I'd have better luck finding a Cherokee rear than a Comanche rear. So do I understand correctly that there is NO cherokee rear that will bolt right in to my pick up? Sorry to be dense. when you guys refer to an XJ is that short for Cherokee just as MJ is short for comanche? to be clear here.. I use this as a daily driver, a work- horse and a beach rig....well I did until my kids got old enough to drive. So I just want a simple 'get it back on the road' fix for now. Upgrading is not what I'm after. I've fixed this old jeep too many times to get very excited about an upgrade. When I bought it, it was a heap. I did a lot of body work and put a nice bright yellow paintjob on it and had the wireing redone and put a new seat in and replaced all sorts of parts ..but in the end my kids bang the hell out of it and I rarely get to drive it. Thanks for the help. I'll try to post a photo Brian

thanks I admit i don't know what the ring gear is so you may need to be more specific.(this is why i'm not repacing gears) I can do the rear end swap but gears scare me. Yes I agree I want to replacee with what was there. Hopefully when my kid leaves for college next fall i'll still have a drivable jeep. (my daughter totaled the last one I had). thanks Brian

HI My kid took my truck out and busted 3 gears in the rear end. I want to grab a used rear axle assembly from the wrecking yard and replace the whole thing. my question; assuming my truck is a stock 89 4x4,inline 6,with 5spd manual...is it a dana 35 or 35c? what's the diff? is it a 3.07 ratio? If I use a cherokee, what model/ package will have the right rear end? I'd be willing to put in the 3.54 ratio or the 3.07. how do I identify what I'm buying? thanks a ton Brian