Gear reducing drive shaft or hubs?

[zensius]

Has anybody ever hear of gear reducing driveshafts or hubs? A friend of mine said he'd heard of the hubs before but I couldn't find any info on the net about them. A wanna know!

 

[wrench67]

as far as add-ons, there's no such thing. however,some vehicles(such as a humvee) do have gearsets inside the back of thew hub.

 

[Speedfreak]

Final drives are either planetary gear sets or step down spur gears used at the axle ends. This is common on military applications and heavy equipment. I have never seen anything like that for a mass production vehicle such as the Explorer.

 

[Sandy]

There is a unit that can be placed in the line of the drive shaft. It can be an OD or a UD (underdrive) unit.
This unit can attach to the end of the transfer case or can be mount detached with a small drive shaft to it and then a drive shaft to the diff.

I think the name was the hone overdrive unit.

 

[zensius]

Thanks Sandy, I used your information to search the web and found the unit is called the Hone-o-drive overdrive unit. Apparently it was made in the seventies in limited numbers. I found it to be mostly used on street cars that wanted to race on weekends. Does anyone think that this could be used effectively on a four wheel drive? Obviously you'd need two. That way your rig could be a good street truck and then at the trail head you could throw the shift lever an BAM! You'd have a killer ratio for rock crawling.

 

[Sandy]

zensius,
Good Morning,
Yes they can be applied to an Off-Road vehicle. Of course that is just another thing to break.
BUT, always the but, you would both re-gear and then use the OD on the rear for street use. $$$$

Another option: there is a unit put out by "Klume" that goes between the transmission and the transfer case, can be setup for as low as 11/1 reduction and applies the reduction to both the front and the rear. It is made for Off-Road/heavy duty applications, that might work.

I run four to ones in the T/C but I have always thought the Klume unit would be the ultimate unit for low, low gear reduction. It is a bit pricey but when you low at re-gearing both diffs and then adding some sort of OD or transmission w/OD the price of the Klume gets better all of the time.

There may be driveshaft work required but I am sure the supplier can tell you whats up before you start.

Try a search on "Klume" and see what happens.

Good Luck,

 

[Alec]

Might be easier if you search for Klune, not klume. Klune is the correct name, good luck!

 

[CoryL]

The Klune-V is a great product. It's a gear reduction box that goes between the transmission and the transfer case of many vehicles.

Unfortunately, they don't make anything that will bolt into a Ranger/Explorer/BroncoII.

So it's not an option unless you run a C5 transmission with the 2.8L bellhousing pattern (same as 2.9L and 4.0L) with a C4 output shaft and tail shaft and then run a Dana 20 or Atlas 2 transfer case after the Klune. Or you could just use a C5 bellhousing and a C4 tranny, then the Klune, and then the D20 or Atlas2.

There are two Klune-V boxes available. One with a 4:1 low range or one with a 2.7:1. They are identical in weight and dimension, but the 2.7:1 box can handle much more torque in low range.

If you want to convert to a 3-speed non-overdrive tranny and want to have a kick ass crawl ratio, then this is for you. You still won't have OD, but who cares about that on the trail anyhow?

 

[zensius]

I looked up the Klune-V ...man that thing is cool! A bit pricey though. And like Cory said it's not available for X's. Taking another route...I saw somewhere that Toyota guys were connecting TWO transfer cases together face to face. Is this possible? Is it possible on an Explorer? Worth it?

 

[Sandy]

If my spelling continues to be this bad then I may not write anymore, just as much but no more.

Well, any thing else, ha... If you are thinking about spending a little $$$, then how about an AtlasII 4.3 or 3.7 for around $2000.00.

There is a kit for that, ISN"T THERE ?!?!? Only Kidding !

Rick and others are running the AtlasII in there "Xs" so we can see that it fits.
You will still need to modify the driveshafts though.

Good Luck,

 

[CoryL]

Originally posted by zensius
I looked up the Klune-V ...man that thing is cool! A bit pricey though. And like Cory said it's not available for X's. Taking another route...I saw somewhere that Toyota guys were connecting TWO transfer cases together face to face. Is this possible? Is it possible on an Explorer? Worth it?

There is a writeup about that at www.therangerstation.com and I know of one other person to do it from RRORC (Tom Campbell) in his 2200lb buggy.

Personally I don't think the stock Ranger/Explorer/BII cases to be all that strong when used in a doubler setup, but that's just me. I have no proof to back that up. Just a gut feeling that with the added weight of a full vehicle it'll go.

The only other way to get better gearing is like Sandy said. Atlas 2 t-case. 4.3:1, 3.8:1, or 3.0:1 low range. They sell one that will bolt directly to a Ranger/Explorer/BII for about $2400.

 

[zensius]

Here's the write up Cory was speaking of. It seems a little more complicated than I imagined.
http://www.therangerstation.com/dualtcase.htm