Solid Axle Swap - truck is in the shop

[tiessen]

Well, my solid swap has begun. I dropped the truck off today. Everyone wish me luck. I'll be interested in comparing Rick's swap (custom) to a more basic swap (read economical). I love Rick's truck but that custom stuff won't fly up here is Canada. No hiem joints, no modified radius arms, etc.

Here's what I'm doing:

1. Bought a Dana 44 from a '79 Bronco, hub to hub including radius arms and steering.

2. Shortened the 44 housing to EB width by cutting R side only. Shortened inner axle shaft to match.

3. New James Duff 3.5" coils in modified buckets.

4. 4.56 gears front and back.

5. Shorten steering to match new width.

6. Fabricate a track bar mount.

7. Re-drill rear axle flanges for 5.5" bolt pattern.

8. New 8" AR black steels.

That's all folks. Should be "economical", I hope.

Cheers

Dale

ps. I keep everyone posted. Rick, maybe I can write up the swap after it's all done?

 

[TNExplorer]

Best of luck on your swap it should work out well for you. You will be using approximately the same parts I used when I did my swap. The only problen I see with what you are doing is that you are going to redrill the rear axle flanges to the 5 on 5 1/2" bolt pattern. I know on my stock rear axles (1993) the flanges are to small to redrill for the new bolt pattern. I had to get custom axles from Moser Engineering to fit the Explorer 8.8 rear housing with the 5 on 5 1/2' pattern. You will be able to redrill the brake drums to fit.
Best of Luck.

 

[Paul Gagnon]

That's cool Dale! Make sure that you get lots of pictures and get Al to take some too.

 

[tiessen]

TNExplorer, well your right. The stock flanges are too small by about 3/8"...crap. I just ordered custom axle shafts from Moser this morning. $295US is alot more than $150 Can to have my flanges redrilled. Oh well, gotta go with the flow.

Cheers

Dale

 

[amigo]

Tiessen,

Olivesman was telling me your are planning to sell the old lift after all the work is done. If so how much you want with shipping and what additional parts will I need to make it complete? I am definately interested in taking it off your hands if you are getting rid of it. Oh yeah and will it fit a 91?

Amigo

Oh yeah email is Amigoisme@aol.com

 

[FROADER]

just curious

Why are you putting a solid axle and cutting it to the samewidth as stock? If anything you should leave it wide and then widen the rear when you can save the money to do that.

 

[tiessen]

I'm cutting down the fullsize for ease in installation. I don't really want the extra 8" of width, don't want to swap the rear axle, and would have a lot of trouble passing inspection up here in Canuck land.

Cheers

Dale

 

[tiessen]

I'm so excited. I pick my truck up from the shop this Fri! So far the swap has been smooth. No unexpected surprises. I can't wait to go wheeling this weekend!

Rick, I'd love to write an article on the swap. I spent some time researching this topic along with some others help and now have 10 pages of instructions on how to swap!

Cheers

Dale

 

[jgriffin]

Hey tiessen, How about some pics?

 

[Rick]

Sounds great, send the articl and photos and we'll put it on line. Do you have any shots you can post here? I would like to see how it looks.

Have a great time this weekend!

 

[tiessen]

No pics yet, but I'll shoot a roll and scan them this weekend. I'll post them on this thread asap. Then I'll do a write up. Now I can't wait until Fri...X-mas has come early.

Rick, how is your rig now? Any other problems? Tested the new setup much? I sure wish I could afford some Baja Claws cause your rig is presently looking quite sweet!

Cheers

Dale

 

[Rick]

No more problems since the first teething pains I have taken it out quite a bit, the pumpkin even has some desert pinstriping now and a few scrapes to boot.

Collin (Fenderguy) and I were even doing some high speed running in one of the washes at Truckhaven and the front end worked great.

 

[Mat R]

Hey so whats the news? You promised pictures and a successful story a week ago. I'm curious to see how your swap worked since it is close to what I'd like to try and do.

Mat

 

[93SPORTIOWA]

and what about

what are you doing with your old lift if amigo doesnt take it let me know

 

[tiessen]

Well, there has been some delay. I'm hopefully picking it up today!

Cheers

Dale

 

[93SPORTIOWA]

what about your old lift?

 

[tiessen]

Yahoo! I picked up my truck last nite. It's awesome.

As for my lift, it's sold, sorry.

Cheers

Dale

I'll have some more info asap.

 

[Mat R]

Pictures! I wanna see pictures!!!



Why I'm not anxious at all.

Mat

 

[tiessen]

It'll take a couple of days to get some pics up. Early next week. The truck drives great. 130km on the freeway steering with 1 finger. The swap was a little more involved than just bolt up. Some 'custom' stuff was done. The coil buckets were particulary troublesome. It would have been easier to replace them. The james duff coils are awesome. Very soft and nice on the rode. I put it up on a 30 degree ramp quickly last nite, didn't measure it but eyed it up. The front end flexes WAY MORE than before in both stuff and droop. It ramped 800 before, I must be close to 1000 now. I update asap.

Cheers

Dale

 

[aphsu92XLT]

Where's the 10 pages?

So where's the 10 page instructions you said you had?? And maybe some pics? I'm really interested in this, because I've been looking to swap out my front end for something incredibly stronger. If you have the details, send them pronto!! Thanks