Axle Re-gearing

Well, looks like it was partially asked in Lanky's thread "98 tj rear axle assembly" but I'll give it a shot anyway:

I've been collecting the tools (and parts) to do a gear & carrier swap/upgrade on a pair of waggy axles; are any old timers out there that have pioneered this and can tell me some pointers? talking about things like back-lash, pinion bearing pre-load, pinion spacing and the like.

If not, I'd gladly offer up help with future mods with you guys, I'll have this figured out soon enough. going from 3.31 open to 4.88 OX locked.

Haskie wrote:Well, looks like it was partially asked in Lanky's thread "98 tj rear axle assembly" but I'll give it a shot anyway:

I've been collecting the tools (and parts) to do a gear & carrier swap/upgrade on a pair of waggy axles; are any old timers out there that have pioneered this and can tell me some pointers? talking about things like back-lash, pinion bearing pre-load, pinion spacing and the like.

If not, I'd gladly offer up help with future mods with you guys, I'll have this figured out soon enough. going from 3.31 open to 4.88 OX locked.

The only person who I think has re-geared himself is member jakes01234. But my memory may not be serving me right.

Also, Mark might have done it, or at least know how. Shoot him a PM by clicking the "Memberlist" at the top of the page. Nice guy, knows his stuff.

hey haskie i just read your post, so let me be the first one to tell you that those old wagoneer axles are super tuff and work great and the OX locker is the BEST by far!! So here is some tech stuff that i hope it helps you when youre ready to start setting up the D44's, when changing the pinion depth whether is from repairs or a rebuild I always make large changes until the pattern is close(the specs should be in your installation kit manual). I consider 0.005” to 0.015” to be a large change and 0.002” to 0.004” to be a small change. Changes of 0.005” to 0.008” or more will lead to the correct pattern faster than small changes will. I purposely make adjustments that I know are moving the pinion too far. If I move the pinion too far and the pattern changes from one extreme to the other then I know that the correct pattern is somewhere between the two extremes. Once I get close to the correct pinion depth I make smaller changes until the pattern is centered between the face and the flank of the ring gear teeth. mmmmm oh yea make sure to check with the for the gear pattern (pinion depth) after you finish with your back-lashing so that your not to far out or to close in. Remember if you move the ring gear closer to the pinion you will decrease backlash but moving the ring gear farther away will increase backlash and last but not least make sure u torque everything to specs i think a D44 is 55 and 60lbs for your Ring Gear and the Cover !
wish you best of luck buddy and put up some pics LOL