- Location
- San Diego
This, among other things.
It's comical to me how people argue that the problem with the D44 is the u-joint, which makes it as weak as a D30. Most u-joint failures occur because the caps start to spin off. If you get Spicer non-greasable u-joints and weld the caps you eliminate this problem. The u-joint will still break, but much, much later - most likely the hub will go first. To me this argument is the same as saying that if you go to a D60 that's not a king-pin then it's no stronger than a D44 because it has ball joints...
newer D60s are Balljoint, even the super-duty 60's are. they are a lot stronger than their KP versions.
the KP version is most sought after because of the length of tube on the driver's side for link placement, and for the ability to easily bolt histeer arms to them. not because they are any stronger.
that is only a problem with the older style ARBs, and it was a design flaw on their end. it is no longer a problem.
really? a low pinion D44? if you said HP44, I'd say yes. but LP... not really.
I've seen a ton of stock shafts spit caps, break cross-shafts and plenty shear the ears on D30's. seen plenty of 760s break in alloy shafts too.
the only time I have seen issues with R/P on a 30 are with RCVs or alloys and CTMs.
that's why my turd has the small hub kit. its the "fuse" but even then, before I bought it, it was run on a YJ on 35"s on every major hammer trail, every trail in moab, all over the southwest, etc for 9 years without a single breakage.
and once you put a D44 ring and pinion in there, you are going to break shafts more often. and every time you do, you shock-load the whole system, you will eventually take out the bearing journals on the carrier.
nobody is really arguing that a D30 is just as strong as a D44... even the Lp44 is a bit stronger.... the bigger problem is that its still not strong enough to run anything bigger than a 35" reliably, and at the cost of doing it, you've lost ground clearance and spent just as much as it would cost to put in a 60 and reliably run a tire that size.
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