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How difficult is it to swap D30 gears?
I have two options... I could swap the gears, which would be free, or I could just get a whole D30 (out of a 95), which would be $50.
well used gears could be a problem. not much experience myself, but having read. seems using old gears in a dif/new carrier can be tougher to setup. and they can be louder even once they are setup properly.
depending what kind of rig they are going into, you could use the time its NOT installed to weld on some lower control arm skids. box in the pass side upper control arm mount. beef it up a bit all around if you wanted.
the gears won't just pop out of one and into another anyway (some setup required), so you'd want to either be paying someone to do the work, or doing it yourself which could take sometime... is your time worth $50?
What about if you got a whole carrier out of a similar axle? I was thinking of just taking a whole carrier with the ring and pinion still on there. I need to regear my Jeep.
I'd like to take the whole carrier out, but a guy on the chapter forum offered me his old gears which happen to be the ratio I need. I'm guessing he regeared and kept his carrier.
Then another guy offered me the whole axle for $50.
If I wasn't tight on $$ I'd go for the whole thing, but I am so it's a concern.
If its gonna be THAT big of a PITA I'll just buy the whole thing, but I dunno.
we just swapped gears setup 5 years ago into a 97's D30 3 months ago and my friend has had no problems with it. he doesn't notice it being any louder, and it has worked just fine for him.
that being said, that was the closest I have come to ever setting up gears, so take it with a grain of salt.
if I was doing it, I'd grab the axle, do some beefing upgrade on it, then toss it under and forget about it.
for $50 you can probably sell yours for the same and be even.
Didn't think about the overhaul kit. Or that I'd end up with another axle to sell afterward.
Fawk it, I'll just buy the damn axle.
Thanks for the help!
Didn't think about the overhaul kit. Or that I'd end up with another axle to sell afterward.
Fawk it, I'll just buy the damn axle.
Thanks for the help!
Keep in mind that you don't know the condition of the $50 axle. You could end up replacing the bearings and seals anyway, then you have an extra axle laying around and have spent the money anyway. Best choice IMO is rebuild your axle then you know what you have, a good axle.
get the money to buy said axle. beef it up. if seals are needed or u find extra money. replace them. everythings easier to do on an axle thats sitting on a bench. just keep that in mind. and spares are nice to have as well.
to drop it in a different axle, you MUST "reset" the gears.
I just bent my dana 30 front axle and replaced it, but had to put the used (original 1986 gears w/ 180k on them) in the "new" axle. I had a friend who does gearing help me out with it....he brought all of his tools to test preload, backlash, gear pattern, etc.
we had to swap the carrier bearings cause they were bad (used his nice gear bearing puller and managed to salvage the bearings off of the 3.07 carrier that had been in the "new" axle), and we needed my large press to do it.
I highly suggest not attempting this yourself. there are many specialty tools involved. we got lucky with mine, it was fairly close and I only had to remove .010 shim on the pinion to set it up identical to before. you could be not so lucky.
I'm irritated tho, need to pull the carrier again...have 4.10 gears and can't pull the center pin out of the carrier with the ring gear on it...the spiders are cracked now. *shrug* at least that won't screw up the gear set.
I'm irritated tho, need to pull the carrier again...have 4.10 gears and can't pull the center pin out of the carrier with the ring gear on it...the spiders are cracked now. *shrug* at least that won't screw up the gear set.
Lincoln lock?
Pretty much though, a master rebuild kit from say, Rusty's is what, 80 bucks? Assuming the axle you'll buy is fine, you'd be saving money. Even if you had to rebuild the new axle it wouldn't cost too much, then you could sell your axle probably for more than $50 and make your money back completely depending on how much work the new axle needs.
Well, I decided I'm gonna buy the new axle, take the gears anyway cause they're free, and stick the new gears in my old axle as a spare while I run the new axle.
And beef up the new axle before I put it in.
lol. yup. I have spare spiders and just wanted to see how it would work.
it would be kickass if I'd gone to a non-disconnect axle with 297 joints.
with the disconnect the steering is just fine. well, other than being severely off because I had to toe it in very far in order to drive it 240 miles home from the badlands
