D30 conversion knuckles, anyone does this?

[Vanimal]

Do not grind down the wedges and weld spring perches to them. They are hollow and that is just dumb. You'll need access to a decent sized lathe, plasma, and good welder if you want to retube it yourself, and it's a pain in the ass.

 

[zachandandy]

Your axle tube is hollow, and the factory spring perches and radius arms are bolted to those wedges so obviously it's a terrible place to mount anything? As I said just grind a flat spot on top to attach a coil spring perch. Or build perches out of box tube wide enough to straddle the wedge and weld it to the axle on either side. Moral of the story is cast wedges do not mean you have to run radius arms.

 

[jeep.kevin]

It's cast steel not cast iron, so no it's not brittle. People weld to the center section all the time for trusses and or shave kits etc. Preheat with a small propane torch, weld with welder of choice(I use my 175a mig), wrap in a welding blanket to cool over night. Never had a crack and I've even welded to my steering knuckle to put my Heims in double shear without issue.

This ^^. Just got done welding on inner Cs for my front HP 44 build and I got multiple run downs like this from some experienced welders I know, and also waded through pirate 4x4. I wrapped mine in moving blankets to let it cool and it worked for me. I used my Hobart 210 MVP. :kissyou: