pamike Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 my brothers jeep was making some noises in the rear end and we found out the right rear axle shaft is bad. in the area where the bearing goes, the shaft is pitted and worn. i don't know if it was because of the bad bearing or not? anyway, it has the d44 with the aluminum housing in it. it's a v8 with full time 4x4. does anyone know what years of jeep had this axle? was it only the v8's. most of the junk yards want to sell us the whole axle but we only need the shaft. if i can find the shaft, how hard is it to pull the shaft vs. the whole axle. his has a abs ring on the shaft and rear disk brakes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Automan2164 Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 I think that that is just a c clip style axle. Pull the brakes, pull the cover, unscrew the cross pin on the spiders, push-in the shaft and a clip will drop in, pull shaft out... What you have is a D44HD. They are a weird friggen axle. You can get what you need from Randy's ring and pinion. Rob L. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shelbyluvv Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 The D44HD was used in almost every year ZJ with a V8 engine. If the Jeep had a V8 it "should" have the D44HD. The WJs use the same rearend but the lug pattern is different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Automan2164 Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 The D44HD was used in almost every year ZJ with a V8 engine. If the Jeep had a V8 it "should" have the D44HD. The WJs use the same rearend but the lug pattern is different. I went through about 7 D44HD's before finding a D35 under a V8 with the correct gearing I need. While I like the D44HD, all the ones I pulled the main caps on had spun races... Good ol' cast iron D35 it is for me. When the D35 is the answer, its not going to be a good day. Rob L. :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pamike Posted August 26, 2010 Author Share Posted August 26, 2010 what jeep is the zj and which is the wj, i'm not familiar with the newer jeep terminology. how strong (or weak) is the d44hd compared to the d35 or 8.25? so theirs no special tools and it's fairly easy to pull the shaft? the place we are going to is about 1.5 hours away from me and i don't want to get there and not have the tool i need. are the right and left shafts different? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mvusse Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 The D44HD was used in almost every year ZJ with a V8 engine. If the Jeep had a V8 it "should" have the D44HD. The WJs use the same rearend but the lug pattern is different. The suspension mounts are different also. The ZJ uses a 4 link with panhard bar, I believe the WJ uses a triangulated 3 link but I still have to crawl under one to see for sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mvusse Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 what jeep is the zj and which is the wj, i'm not familiar with the newer jeep terminology. how strong (or weak) is the d44hd compared to the d35 or 8.25? so theirs no special tools and it's fairly easy to pull the shaft? the place we are going to is about 1.5 hours away from me and i don't want to get there and not have the tool i need. are the right and left shafts different? ZJ is the 93 through 98 Grand Cherokee. WJ is 99 through 04 Grand Cherokee. The D44HD seems like a good axle in theory, but it has an aluminum differential housing that deforms easily. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geonovast Posted August 26, 2010 Share Posted August 26, 2010 ZJ is 93-98 Grand Cherokee WJ is 99-04 Grand Cherokee Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete M Posted August 27, 2010 Share Posted August 27, 2010 When the D35 is the answer, its not going to be a good day. Rob L. :D :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: the ZJ 44 is a strong axle (apparently uses a lot of the same parts as the Viper), but it doesn't have enough longevity for Jeeps (how many vipers do you know with 200k miles?). it just wears out too fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Comanche County Posted August 27, 2010 Share Posted August 27, 2010 One of my ZJs has 233K on the "Super" D44 or D44A what ever you want to call it and no problems that I know of. Might be an exception to the rule though. That ZJ is about to sell though. My other ZJ has one as well. It's got 156K and there's no problems with it either. Although I can hear some gear whine around 40-45 mph. It goes away any slower or faster. Problems with these are common. According to Randy's Diff book, it is also in one of the Corvette models as well as the Viper. Check out this page, I think he has a good set up with his: http://www.cardomain.com/ride/771987. Scroll down to see the truss he installed. I was going to replace mine with an 8.8 but decided I wanted to keep the ABS set up. I think I'll just keep run it till it breaks. :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shelbyluvv Posted August 27, 2010 Share Posted August 27, 2010 The difference between the Viper and Vett diff is that they only use the center section. They both have IRS. they do not have to support the weight of a 4K Jeep off the tubes. Either way I have beat the living hell out of my WJ and it is still going strong. I have owned it since it was new in 04 and just now returned it to stock and bought the Ram for towing duties. Here is the WJ with the lift, there is also a vidieo at the bottom http://www.bds-suspension.com/pj/pj_rec ... hp?pri=822 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete M Posted August 27, 2010 Share Posted August 27, 2010 The difference between the Viper and Vett diff is that they only use the center section. They both have IRS. they do not have to support the weight of a 4K Jeep off the tubes. ding-ding-ding-ding! :thumbsup: I'm sure that has a lot to do with it. It's possible that by the introduction of the WJ they figured out how to make them right. :dunno: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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