No locking hubs on xj

[GWUISTER]

I just bought a 96 xj. Nice truck great potential. After crawling around it I see that the front axels and driveshaft spin all the time. There are no locking hubs and no axel disconnect even tho it has a part time transfer case.
Seems like freewheeling the front wheels with some hubs like on my cj would be a good thing.
Has this been done? I don't see any kits for the xj.
Greg

[xj92]

Warn makes a kit, but it's $700 or more IIRC. Not really worth it. Most people live with the stuff always turning, or just swap out the entire front axle for a 44 with hubs already in it.

[Eagle]

Warn makes two kits. One uses the stock 5-on-4.5" bolt circle, the other uses a larger bolt circle that requires different rims.

Milemarker offers a kit very similar to the Warn kit using the stock wheel bolt spacing. I agree this is the way the XJ should have been sold (or at least should have been available as a factory option), but most people run with the front always engaged and don't have problems.

[vintagespeed]

The benefits of the WARN kit are not only a full-floating front axle without a unitized bearing, but the chromoly 30 spline stubs and 297x ujoint size milled for snap rings. If you bust a stub on the trail stock......you're screwed if you dont have a spare. The hub assy will fall apart without a stub holding it in place. The MM kit looks a little cheesy to me, I bought Warn cause I bought their winch and I dont trust my rig to poser products.

I ran the WARN 5 x 4.5 kit with 35s on some of the hardest trails in CA and didn't ever worry about breaking. Good stuff. However with the new rotors & machining & spare hub I paid well over $1k for the conversion. If I had it to do again I would've built a D44 front the start.