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Long bed driveshaft in a short bed???


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I am sure this has been discussed... sorry for not searching very much.

 

does anyone know if a longbed driveshaft would be a good fit in my Sprung over D35 Shortbed truck? Which I hear is around 6" of lift.

 

My current drive shaft keeps pulling out of the yoke.

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Too long. The longbed has 6" more driveshaft length. But, it'd be a good candidate for taking to a shop and getting it shortened to the proper length.

 

 

If you've got an 4.0L/auto, you can get a driveshaft from a 4.0L/stick and get one more inch of driveshaft length.

 

 

And please see Rule #2

 

http://comancheclub.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1239

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The long bed drive shaft w. AW4 is 60" yoke cap to yoke cap, so take a measurement. Or you could install one of these long slip yokes providing your front u-joint angle isn't too extreme. I used one (cut it down) and it works fine. But I only have a 3" lift, so my u-joint angles aren't as much as yours.

 

http://tinyurl.com/6z4k9l

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I don't think anyone has touched on this, but changing from sprung under to sprung over doesnt seem like it would equal 6" of lift, unless your axle tube was 6" in diameter..?

 

Or am I missing something...

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I don't think anyone has touched on this, but changing from sprung under to sprung over doesnt seem like it would equal 6" of lift, unless your axle tube was 6" in diameter..?

 

Or am I missing something...

 

add the spring perch height as well, plus the thickness of the pack.

 

it's very easy to turn a spring-over project into an 8" lift project.

 

as for shaft interchangeability...yes, you can. but there are several factors.

 

the only shafts that I KNOW for fact will change are;

 

4wd 4 cylinder (or 2.8 v6) 4wd manual trans longbed with dana 35 rear axle

2wd 4.0 auto shortbed with dana 44 rear

 

HOWEVER you will also need to swap axles to accomplish that swap; the dana 44 driveshaftshaft is around 1" shorter than the dana 35 driveshafts are.

 

in short, I used a shortbed 4.0 auto 2wd dana 44 equip rear driveshaft in my 86 comanche, which had the drivetrain of 2.8 v6 5 speed dana 35, and I upgraded the rear axle to a dana 44 (roasted the 35)...so i used the axle and shaft from the other truck and took the junk parts off of this truck and put them in it.

 

if you don't follow, i can try and make it less confusing :nuts: :chillin:

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  • 1 month later...

I'm confused, how much of my slip yoke needs to go into the thing to be efficient enough?

 

also, do you have another link for one of those longer slip yokes? Mine is an 89 4.0L Auto Shortbed if it helps, I don't know what I am looking for!

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I'm confused, how much of my slip yoke needs to go into the thing to be efficient enough?

Enough to keep it from falling out when the suspension droops, and still have enough spline engaged to drive the truck without shearing off the splines.

 

But you also have to remember that the suspension compresses, and as the suspension compresses it shoves the slip yoke deeper into the transfer case. You need to cycle your suspension to the bumpstops and make certain that the yoke is going to be smashed into the tailshaft or tailshaft housing at full suspension compression.

 

If you have a big lift, with a correspondingly high driveshaft angle, and a very flexy suspension, the yoke may actually move more than your yoke and tailshaft can accommodate. If that happens you have two choices:

 

(1) Install limiting straps and/or bump stops to reduce the total amount of suspension (and thus yoke) travel; or

 

(2) Install a slip yoke eliminator and have a drive shaft made up with a long slip spline in the drive shaft.

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yeah, I just want my drive shaft to stay in when I hit the breaks... haha!

 

Just was hoping that there was some sort of way to figure out how long of a shaft I need without going the SYE route - too expensive for my little beater.

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