One up on "Nicks POS", sorry Nick

[inVERt'D]

Gotcha. And I know the feeling...

[YJReed]

Well got the gears, bering kit, and fill in t\c just wont have the time to do the install till Wednesday.

[6spdYJ]

All YJ's with the 6 and 5 speed had 3.07's. The 6/auto had 3.55 and all 4bangers got 4.10's. The best bang for the buck is a 4 cyl front with TJ/95+ shafts and source an 8.8 from an Exploder 95+. The 8.25 from a Cherokee is a fair upgrade and probably cheaper, but a bit limited in mods later down the road. A 44 from a Cherokee or Comanche is good, but rare and guys think they're made of Irridium. If you have time and some fab skills, a ScoutII 44 74+ is easy to build up and swap in. (I'll admit to being biased here). Overall, don't walk away from the D35 - RUN! If you doubt what you hear, I grenaded mine on a paved road while driving to work. Look up the one car too far episode titled "volcano". How hard do you think they were pushing that 35 while driving downhill on ice?

[inVERt'D]

By the way, Glenn, how did you break that ring gear?

[YJReed]

i didnt actually break the ring gear, but i did break some large parts of the teeth off my pinion and broke the pinion bearing. i also found out i need spider gears as well bc they are chewed up from grinding all the metal chucks from the pinion

[inVERt'D]

Just driving on pavement, more or less? My guess would be that the pinion bearing failed and things went downhill from there.

[6spdYJ]

Weirdly enough, the 35 has a bigger pinion bearing than the 44. The spiders on the other hand, wouldn't be big enough for a Tonka truck.

[inVERt'D]

I wasn't thinking of the size of the bearing, just a likely chain of cause and effect.

[6spdYJ]

A bigger bearing is less likely to throw chunks. The spiders in the 35 like to snap off teeth and these in turn get fed through the R/P.

[inVERt'D]

This discussion is thankfully beyond my expertise in Dana 35s. Maybe YJReed was mistaken about the pinion going first, but from his description, that's what it sounds like to me. Bearing size aside, if the pinion nut gets loose, the pinion will move around and things won't stay pretty for long. That's the scenario that played through my mind.

How far apart are the pinion bearings on a D35 compared to a D44?

[6spdYJ]

How far apart are the pinion bearings on a D35 compared to a D44?

About 85" - sorry, too easy.

[inVERt'D]

About 85" - sorry, too easy.

A Dana 44 front and a Dana 35 rear would be an interesting combo. I wouldn't have thought of it. Smartass.