Nice progress on the axle!!

That is a great turn around on the use of that old boat trailer. Way more useful now!!

 

Thanks. I wish I could of made more progress, just need the time.

Yea the trailer turned out nice. We were actually given the trailer so thats even better. I done all the welding (well minus a few small welds) on it. My first big welding project. I figured it would give me plenty of practice to be ready for my 4runner lol.

 

Not much of an update, but I did finish welding the truss on yesterday evening... ONE inch at a time lol. One thing I didnt like about the TG truss is it doesnt seal up on one of the corners. Since this will see some mud from time to time, I didnt want any openings to allow mud/water to get in there. So I made this little piece to seal it up.





If the weather is right this evening, Im gonna take the axle to the car wash to clean it up some and then start dissassembling it..

 

Well I apparently didn't look hard enough at the ubolt location before adding that piece. I looked and didn't think it would hit but I was wrong. Looks like I'm gonna have to cut it out. Oh well lol.

I disassemble the axle earlier, well everything but taking apart the spindles from the knuckle. I'll have to do that once I get my 54mm socket in. I ordered it yesterday. I took a few pics but I'll have to upload them later

 

Since I like seeing pics in a build thread (even if everyone has seen this kind of stuff before), here are some pics of the axle tear down.















Now comes the fun part of cleaning all this stuff up and preping for paint and reassembly.

 

I got a little bit accomplished this weekend. I was waiting for my 54mm socket to come in to dissassemble the knuckles, but I decided to go ahead and use the hammer/punch trick and take them apart.

This is what I ended up with after dissassembly.




One of the knuckles cleaned, just needs paint now


One of the birfields dissasembled and cleaned. Done them one at a time so I could make sure I put the cage back in correctly


And my resting place for the clean parts.


My knuckle balls had some pitting...


So some JB weld was needed


Im slowly getting there lol

 

My first thought when I saw those pics. Tear down and clean looks good!

 

Very nice. Giving more motivation to tear mine down

 

Thanks. All these builds on here gave me the motivation to do mine.

 

Sweet build

 

Thanks.

 

Not much progress has been made. Ive been busy with everything else. I did manage to rebuild 3 of the 4 steering stops. I cut off the majority of the original stop, bent some angle iron to the correct shape, and welded it up. I used some thinner metal than original due to thats what I had, so I also added in some nuts to give it some added strenght. I also will be capping the stops.






I also did some sanding on the JB Weld on the knuckle balls, but didnt take any pictures. I had to add some more JB Weld, so I will get some pics after I finish sanding.

After I get the axle parts painted, Im going to be at a stand still with the front axle. Im waiting to figure out what Im going to do about gears before I put it back together. So I will probably pull the 4runner in the shop to pull the motor/trans/tcase.

 

Nice progress. What gears are you thinking about running?

 

I want to run 4.88. I have been tryin to make a run to the closest u-pull-it as they have 3 4runners that have the possiblity of having stock 4.88 gears, but something has happened everytime Ive tried. If that fails, then I might just buy gears and learn how to regear my 3rds myself.

 

I'm not sure that there are stock 4.88 gears?

Is your goal 33 or 35" tires when done?

You are making me really look forward to tearing into my axle.

 

4.88 came stock in pickups and 4runners. I just sold a set of 4.88 3rds out of my parts truck. The 4.88's came in the 3.0's with auto trannys

 

You could find a set for the rear but need to buy new for the front 8" third right?

 

You can use rear factory 4.88s in the front too. I thought they only came in 4runners with a 3.0/auto but that's good to know about the trucks too. Wish mine had 4.88s. I think they started in 92 or so tho.

I plan to run a 35-37 tire. I figure the 4.3 will do pretty good with them and 4.88. If not, I'll get some 5.29s.

 

If you want to go that big 4.88s are not enough.

I have 5.29 gears for my 35" tires. It's a perfect match. If you went to 37" tires and 4.88 gears it will be a gutless pig I promise you.

 

Im not so sure about the gutless pig part. You do realize the gm 4.3 makes 33% more HP and 42% more torque that then 3.slo (based on numbers I found on the internet). Those are peak numbers of course. Heck my 3.0 is so weak right now it struggles with the 31s I have. Soley based on ratios, running 35s w/ 4.88 gears isnt much different than the factory tire and gear ratio that the truck im taking the 4.3/trans out of came with.

Am I saying that I wont need more gear..no. But I am saying that I can get factory 4.88 3rd members for $89/each at the u-pull-it, so its cheap enough for me to try. I have intentions on going with a dual case setup at some time also. So that will help too. If I cant find factory 4.88s cheap enough, I guess I will considering upgrading to 5.29s, but I will cross that bridge when I get there.