4.56 gears mini thread --progress???

 6-13-12
 After the debacle of the non fitting gears, I have ordered 4.56 thick ring gears for the axles.
At 60 mph, the rpms w 36" tires should be 2750 now in 3rd and about 2000 in 4th. (700r4)
  I almost got 4.88 gears but 2950 rpm was too much for driving down the road to get anywhere.
Low crawl ratio should be 37:1- quite respectable for an est. 2700lb vehicle.
That is all for now.  God Bless America.

6-18-12 update

The gear set I've ordered showed up, well- one of them,  and was installed.

The setup guy called and said it went well, but he wanted to know how long

it would take to get the other set.  I called the ebay store and after sitting on hold

for a couple minutes, said "oh here it is." 

 (I'm thinking that some axles could've been in the garage right now- whatever) .  Hopefully it will be overnighted and I can get them by tomorrow night or Wednesday.



4.30 gears again WARNING DON"T DO IT!!!!

**UPDATED WARNING!!  ISUZU DANA 44 GEARS, CARRIERS, AND HOUSINGS
ARE PROPRIETARY AND **CANNOT** BE INSTALLED IN JEEP, SCOUT, FORD, DODGE, CHEVY HOUSINGS WITHOUT MASSIVE MACHINING***

This IS a relief to me that I'm NOT crazy because I couldn't set up the gears.  The shops top
builder messed with it for hours and called dana corp direct.  It turns out dana built the 44 for isuzu, but to accomidate the thick gears it had a special carrier and housing.  Isuzus housing moves the pinion about 1/2" further away to compensate for the thick gears.

I'm estimating that this little factoid that the gear seller off of ebay ("yea it will work in all dana 44's") didn't disclose cost me about $400 in tools, gears, and unknown cost on time.

I'm on the hunt for some 4.56ish thick gears now.... otherwise new carriers are in order.
I'm also going to send dip**** on ebay a line to tell him he screwed me.

The 33mpg honda fit parts car to the rescue again. 

luckily I didn't get full size axles, because @54" long the housing "fit" in just right. rdrr.

If you have been looking through this blog at all, you'll notice that I started this major undertaking in March.

I found a couple shops in the metroplex that could set up an axle for the cost of the

tools to do it at home.  Unfortunately I already blew the money for the tools at home, and after

banging my head against these things for mucho hours trying to get them right,

I'll gladly pay an expert to do it.  

a post about almost nothing- now something

I've gotten nothing accomplished on the Jeep in the past month. I did add some fuel stabilizer and run it awhile though- it helped.

I'm also changing the fuel filter to a mid 90s grand cherokee inline model (designed for efi)
to see if that is why it stalls out at 3K rpm sometimes.
**update 6-1-12 the jeep now revs past 3K easily- a quick and easy $13 fix.  go me. The engine sounds more I dunno- solid. 

oh- and now the jeep is on the* 3rd* "lifetime" alternator from o reillys.
they work for awhile, then stop and have a super high pitched electrical hum until the battery charging wire is removed.   
I rewired the plug to the "I" post instead of the "L" post to see if this helps.  The directions say power to either one will work, but this may be the problem.

The exhaust collector gaskets that were put on with the new exhaust went south, and started warming
up the floorboards when running.  The exhaust gasket material burnt off when the exhaust got its workout at megarun.  So some copper mr gasket seals (sorry- just have the package) replaced them.
after snugging up the exhaust again, the jeep idled better- probably because the o2 sensor got  something to read instead of getting intermittant signals.

front axle work

Scouts had 0* caster built into their axles, a spring over lift needs roughly 6* (from what I've researched) to keep the pinion angle happy on and off road.  
After finding 0* with the stock pads on the stands, I used a punch to mark 0* on the tube and knuckle, then rotated the axle/pads to 6* and re punched. mark them away from where the grinder will hit.

This is the amount that the steering knuckles need to move. 

Just cut and rotate them- easy right?  Figure 2+ hours per side if you

haven't ever done this before.

Tools needed: 4.5" angle grinder with grinding wheel and minimum 2 cutting wheels,

wire wheel, welder and accessories, protractor,  stands,

 3lb and 5 lb sledges ( i used the backside of the wood maul)

marker, punch, and loss of mental function for doing this.

you can see the hairline crack- this is where the tube meets the knuckle..you have to grind deep enough to find this, deep enough into the knuckle to remove all the weld, but not too much.

This is the stock 0* before knuckles

note the cleanliness of the driveway before pounding

this is the 6* (far side) and 0* close side

all this dirt came out of the axle tubes because the

axle seals were still in.  BFH on right side of picture.

Here is where a lot of time was taken up- note the ring between the tube and knuckle

in the middle.  This was a teeny tiny amount of weld (maybe an inch) that penetrated deeper

than the rest at the factory- the result was a lot of pounding to get it to rotate

Safety note** I re-welded the knuckles using 4 + passes with a 180A welder to fill and strengthen

the ground out parts.  If you have any doubts - hire a professional

welder to get the parts reunited!  If not done right, figure the entire

wheel assembly rotating in a weird direction , locking up your steering,

or leaving the vehicle while driving. (either is bad)

meet the new gears / mini locker rev1

Ok- so the jeep is now a jeep-chevy-scout-isuzu hybrid.  It IS all American though- the isuzu came with a rear dana 44  (courtesy of the USA)  with 4.30 gears. (with a custom center pumpkin)
The differnce is that the isuzus ring gear is thicker and the pinion gear , the gear side bearing is puny compared to the scouts the yolk side is exactly the same.

*****update...  isuzu had proprietary dana 44s with special carriers and pumpkins-  they won't work in US vehicle dana 44s- they are >1/2" off!!!!******** regardless of what the guy that sold them on ebay says.
It falls half way through the scouts race before seating.  the isuzus bearing race wallers around in the scouts housing.

The first time since 1974 that these two guys have parted ways

Note the scouts ring on the left, and the isuzus on the right. 

 The  inner spacing ring measured exactly the same between the two, it just that one on the right is thicker.

Because of this, if the carrier pin ever has to come out, the ring has to come off.

Here's the pinion and all accessories from the rear axle.

The shims go between the housing and the bearing races.

Note the mangled oil slinger next to the gear.  somehow

parts of it are chewed off.  It turns out the rear had koyo

bearings but still had timken carrier

bearings, so it had been gotten into before.

isuzu on stock scout carrier up and scout ring lower

---------------------------------

 a mini spool isn't just a name- it really is small

Here's what it looks like taken apart. The round parts go into the side of the carrier, and the carriers cross pin goes through the square blocks.  100% lockup.  If I want to change it back later- the spider

gears can be back in within an hour.

post incident assessment

Cleaned everything out of the commando after megarun. The jeep seems to be in very good condition considering being bounced all over in E. Texas.   Found dirt, tree branches, and that all the tools in back were bounced around so much that the came out of their cases. (including the winching kit and a 200 pc electrical connector kit.)
After 1/2 hr picking up parts, I was advised by the boss that the jeep needs bucket seats and a roll cage before it goes out with the family in it. 
Ok twist my arm.  I'll get on it after the rest of the repairs.
Still have axles (coil sprung front??), front shocks, driveshafts, POWER steering, trim bodywork, armor, seats, herculiner, and a cage.
The easiest coil front would be to make it like a land rover defender / early bronco with the coil buckets/ shock towers
and positioning arms off the frame. 
This guy hob-nailed one together in Norway: http://www.fullsizejeep.com/1024/p_suspension.htm

Megarun v2.0

screw it, i'm wheeling it with a dana 30 and 44 tomorrow.   if it can make it around the block by itself, it can make it out there. going to bolt on the rear bumper and skid plate and tow hooks and just go for it.

Pre incident. just got done running some 3 diamond trails, the narrow wheelbase

is a big plus cutting between trees, but the manual steering eats that up.

Got so off camber on politician trail that a guy had to push on the passenger

corner of the roof to keep it upright until the jeep got to where it could right itself.

Wheel base and lift height are excellent.

Rocker knocker.  

The jeep covered 3/4 of the rock garden

without any dings except for a shock just driving it slow. 

One time during competition though and poof- insta dent!

  I obviously didn't get the side plates on, but in a way its good.

The plates would have been dragged off by the rear tires hitting the corner of the

wheel flares.  So now I know what to trim.

The previous test run on the rock garden proved that the shocks weren't up to the test.

It flexed the eye and upper mount off the shock, and the shock was dangling

by the 3/4 mark of the course.

Everybody couldn't believe that 36" tires were shoved up that

 far into the wheel well

See whats missing from the previous posts pics.

All I can say is re check everything before going out. 

Oh BTW- I installed a Clarke 180 (very rare option ) posi locker

in the rear.  Worked awesome.

Heres what stopped me dead on the rock garden during competition.  The front end flexed farther than the driveshaft

would allow and ripped the yolk from the shaft.  An in-situ weld kept it going for the rest of the day.

 The "mighty" dana 30- still in one piece after being bashed on boulders.  Still can't

wait to get the d44's on ....