OOOOPPPS!

[smalls2010]

Ok, here is the story.

Yesterday, me and five of my buddies went up skiiing at winter park. We drove my jeep and my friend's 4runner. I was not driving my jeep as I was hungover as s%$& because the day before was my 18th birthday. So my buddy Nick was driving. We finally left home around ten and started driving. Everything was going fine until we got up to idaho springs. Then I started to hear a crazy loud hum (louder than usual), i could barely talk to nick sitting right next to me. Then.... BANG!!!! and a ton of clunking... Nick pulled over, and we got out and looked underneath. Just as I expected, the rear driveshaft was just sitting on the ground... That sucks!!! Determined to complete our day of skiing, we threw the driveshaft in the trunk, slapped the jeep in 4hi and continued on our way. My jeep has never ridden so quietly! We had a great day of skiing, and the jeep got us home in front wheel drive. And now its time to asess the damage...

Turns out the ujoint and the differential siezed and snapped off. I knew the ujoints were in bad shape and needed replaced. They were not the greasable kind.

The yoke on the differential also suffered some damage... luckily i have a spare 8.25 in my garage. To switch the yokes, do you simply remove the nut in the center and slide it out? or is it more complicated than that?

The drive shaft is toast, but i have a spare set of driveshafts from a '90 i parted out. These shafts actually seem to be in great shape and do not seem old at all. They also have greasable ujoints on them. My only concern is that the rear one from the 90 is about an inch longer than the one off my 2000... Is that how they were? Or is it some sort of custom shaft designed for the 4" lift??? Can I use it? The yoke slips perfectly into my tcase.

Here are some pics:
http://s572.photobucket.com/albums/ss166/bsmallwood2010/Jeep%20Damage/

My game plan:
Replace the yoke on the axle with the one from my spare 8.25.
Replace both driveshafts with the spare ones i have with the greaseable ujoints.

OR

Spend some more money and do an sye and use my spare front shaft in the rear.


Opinions and suggestions? let me know what you guys think.

[bigalpha]

Yoke should come off by removing that (28mm?) nut.

[Kiefer316]

I say order up an sye. How long was your old shaft?

[YELLAHEEP]

Geez..... ya call me yesterday asking all this...... Didn't like my answers? :D

The shaft from the '90 can work, but you have to take good measurements. The issue is having the slip yoke on the t-case end of the '90 driveshaft TOO far onto the t-case output shaft. If you compress the suspension, the slip yoke needs to travel up on the t-case output without bottoming out.

If you're already running a lift (4" I think you mention) then the inch longer '90 shaft would be a good thing, but from the pics, it looks more than an inch longer.

Basically measure the distance between the pinion yoke (starting at the seat where the driveshaft bearing cap sits) up to the end of the t-case output shaft. The XJ should be sitting flat on the ground, no jacks or stands - static height.

Take that measurement and then measure the '90 driveshaft from the far side of the rear u-joint bearing cap along the driveshaft up to the slip yoke. Hopefully, the measurement stops somewhere midway or just short of midway on the slip yoke, leaving an inch or two of depth on the slip yoke for the output shaft to compress onto. Ya dig?

[NW-ZJ-SCOTT]

the "loud hum" kinda sounds like a pinion bearing.. Are you sure your rear diff is okay?

[mcantar18c]

The different length DS is likely cause it was from a turdy-five... the D35 and 8.25 have a slight difference in pinion lengths, hence different length driveshafts... I think the 35 shaft is the longer one but I'm not sure.
But Bayne, this is a pretty good excuse to throw an SYE on. When shit breaks, upgrade it! You'll be much happier with the end result.

[Kiefer316]

I would SYE it. I saw someone posted up a cheap SYE kit somewhere it was only 150 bucksish, You already have a front shaft too.

[ColoradoRaptor]

the "loud hum" kinda sounds like a pinion bearing.. Are you sure your rear diff is okay?

The loud hum was the u-joint taking a dump!! If it were the pinion bearing he should have had noise when driving in front wheel drive!!

[smalls2010]

OK so i swapped the yokes out on the diffs, and that was a peice of cake. The spare driveshaft i had was too long to fit into my jeep... so i went to the junkyard on a hunt. Every single rear driveshaft was bent from the forklifts! I checked about 25 post 96 xjs there. I found a complete overhead console from a 97 tho... its still at colorado auto and parts if anyone wants it. I think keifer is going to hook me up with a driveshaft though. Then Im going to replace all my ujoints with hq greasable ones. Im also going to change the angle of my rear diff. The leaf springs taper the angle too much with the tcase drop kit. I didnt realize that angle was off so badly. Thanks everyone for the help!