RB project Updates

[Scorpionita]

Good luck Osama for your project can't wait till you finish and see the final look for the car
by the way MABROUK ya m3awad 3ala first star as newbie ,,, happy for you w inshallah soon we will see you in the sand

[ossme]

Good luck Osama for your project can't wait till you finish and see the final look for the car
by the way MABROUK ya m3awad 3ala first star as newbie ,,, happy for you w inshallah soon we will see you in the sand

Thank you and ALLAH YEBAREK FEE 7YATEK !

Getting my first start was very hard but I'm glad that I finally got it ! I think that they will immediately take it back once they see my manual gear driving skills !

I hope that the car will be ready for tommorow, it will be a good time to test and see how it goes.

woooow ... congraaaats ...

This is truly a TJ D44 front !
probably with a factory rubicon air locker which is coooool .... 4.10 with 31" and the bigger diameter ring gear will be amazing!
and if you got a D44 rear with 4.10 as well it has the airlocker as well !!!!
Commonly known as Tru Lok:
The front is part number "AirLoc", and the cost is $529.95. The rear is part number "AirLocr" and costs $679.95. Those are the Daimler-Chrysler parts, you will also need a pair of air pumps, part number 7938693926, price $159.00. (and two electrical switches and some air locker air hoses)

I never thought sharjah is importing TJ rubicon stuff or so many US rubicons on the streets ... **** mussaffah, especially our particular Jeep Junker there who is even more expensive than the dealership and is grabbing anything Jeep related in AD

Now get inner sleeves and C-gussets and 30 spline chromoly axle shafts with stronger u-joints and your front end is bomb proof!

Thanks! Yes, the front one got a factory air locker. i have already ordered the air compressor to test and see if it still works.

Unfortunately, the rear is a normal one that doesn't come with a locker. it is an older Diff and honestly, it is not in a great shape.
The rear carrier, ring and pinion are showing some signs of wear. Therefore I'm planning to install an ARB (or chinese ?) Air locker with new ring, pinion and bearings kit sometime in the future. this way, I will have a front and rear lockers with minimum cost.

It was extremly hard to find the second Diff. But things there are much cheaper than Abu Dhabi. Here are some more pics of the Diffs.

Front_D44_airline.jpg

rear_dana44.jpg

There are currently getting cleaned and painted. After that, we will start the installation. If every thing goes according to plan, I hope to finish today before 12:00am. After that I will start installing the WARN bumper and K&N air filter and that will be as much as I can do before the trip.

BTW, the CA mount was also fixed. The guys at Green did a great job they cost me AED800 but it was worth it. Unfortunately, I don’t have many pictures of the process because it was dark and my phone camera couldn’t show anything other than a black screen.
They fixed the mount and then welded it back on three different locations using MIG weld. After that, they painted to cover the weld. Now, You can’t tell that the mount was welded as it looks exactly like the other one.

part of the Welded Rear Mount.jpg

Sorry for not posting too many pictures and I promise that things will change once I take the car back to my home work shop.

See you guys on tomorrow's trip. Hopefully with a Jeep !

[SSS]

hmm ... ambitious plans for tonight

just make sure the rear D44 without air locker has the same ratio (4.10) (wld be strange btw... I would expect 3.73 ... was standard for gcc TJ rear non rubi D44!) ... for tomorrow!
otherwise driving in 4wd might blow your TC

in the rear selectable locker is cool ... but expensive. have you thought about TrueTrac gear driven (torsen type) full case LSD for the rear? I have it (front and rear) and I LOVE it in the sand and on road ... absolutely no brainer traction booster ... and tough.

if you go for new R&P in 4.10 : try to get factory Dana Spicer ... STILL the best! (no time for break in tonight )
if you want to gear higher (4.56 for your manual tranny and 33") avoid superior! Go for Motive, Nitro(!) or Yukon worst case.

cu 2mrw !!!

[ossme]

hmm ... ambitious plans for tonight

Well , I failed !

just make sure the rear D44 without air locker has the same ratio (4.10) (wld be strange btw... I would expect 3.73 ... was standard for gcc TJ rear non rubi D44!) ... for tomorrow!
otherwise driving in 4wd might blow your TC

Yep, I double checked the label on the Pinion and it says 4:10

in the rear selectable locker is cool ... but expensive. have you thought about TrueTrac gear driven (torsen type) full case LSD for the rear? I have it (front and rear) and I LOVE it in the sand and on road ... absolutely no brainer traction booster ... and tough.

I thought of many options. But I really like to have a selectable locker. I will decide once I reach that step.

if you go for new R&P in 4.10 : try to get factory Dana Spicer ... STILL the best! (no time for break in tonight )
if you want to gear higher (4.56 for your manual tranny and 33") avoid superior! Go for Motive, Nitro(!) or Yukon worst case.

Thanks for the advice. You just saved me hours of searching !

[ossme]

Well here is some updates of the project ..

We start Thursday at 5:00pm with installation of front and rear diffs.
First, the rear diff which didn't cause us any issues.

rear_dana44_installed.jpg

Preparing and installing the front diff took more time and we finished mounting it at 11:00pm.

front_dana44_painted.jpg

Things however started falling apart when I discovered that the front drive shaft is 2" longer and cannot be installed. To make things worse all shops were closed and I couldn't do anything about it !

So, after missing the trip on Firday (the other car was also in the dealer), I decided to start working on the drive shaft. I temporarily shortened the front drive shaft to allow it to fit. which worked nicely since as a temporary solution.

I decided to take the car in a test drive, the rear acted as expected. But another disaster struck when I engaged the 4wd! The Front diff is having a strange issue that I couldn't determine ! It keeps steering to heavily to the right !!

At this point I took the car home and called it a day.

So I woke up on Saturday Morning and decided to do some upgrades and maintenance at home before taking the car to WM to check the front diff.

First, I replaced the Front Tube bumper with Warn. I did this because the Tube bumper didn't offer any recovery points.

Front_Warn_Bumper.jpg

After that, I replaced the K&N Filter. Can you tell which one is which ?

New_air_filter.jpg

Lastly, I installed a Temprary Battery Bracket. Yep, the previous owner was offroading without it.

Battery_Holder.jpg

After that, I took the car to WM to check the front diff. They told me that it might be an issue with the installation of gears or a bad locker but they needed a day to check. So, I'm currently waiting for a phone call from them.

I hope that it is not a serious issue !

[ossme]

just make sure the rear D44 without air locker has the same ratio (4.10) (wld be strange btw... I would expect 3.73 ... was standard for gcc TJ rear non rubi D44!) ... for tomorrow!
otherwise driving in 4wd might blow your TC

Yep, I double checked the label on the Pinion and it says 4:10

OKAY... I found what was wrong with the car and what I'm going to say now is a bit embarrassing.

I was in the office yesterday supervising some maintenance work. Waiting for the guys to finish installing the new equipment, I spaced away to thinking about RB and the problem with the rear Diff. I made a check list and reviewed each of the points.

Everything was fine until I reached "Check the front and rear R&P ratio". I'm sure that the front is 4:10 (Because it came from a Rubicon). But what about the rear? I remembered the tag on the diff which said "41 11". That should be 4:11 right? WRONG! 41 / 11 is 3.73 !! BIG MISTAKE!!

I called WM and told them to check this. They called me back and confirmed that this was the case! They also gave me a quote of AED 1750 not including parts to replace it. I have to source the parts myself. I can do this myself in my home workshop, so I went to them and took the car home.

The first thing I did after that was disconnecting the rear driveshaft and engaging the 4wd. Not only the front diff works, It was in a perfect condition.

So, Now I have two options:

Option 1: Upgrade the Ring and Pinion on the rear to 4.11 (4.09) gear ration.

This option is cheapest in the short term and the modification required is minimum. I don't need to miss up with the front and I don't need to change the tires (which are pretty new). The down side? No body have 4.11 thick Ring and Pinion. So I need to order it from the States which is two weeks waiting time. + I will be changing it in a year or so (Once I go with 33" tires).

Option 2: Upgrade the Ring and Pinion on the front and rear with 4.56 gears.

This option is the cheapest long term solution. But it is very expensive on short term. I need to upgrade the tires to 33", and I will be buying two Sets of R&P instead of one. This will put me close to AED 6000. This of course, does not include other stuff like upgrading the suspension or getting a body lift.

It is a shame that I will be missing with a perfectly good front axle. Also, I never worked with the Jeep Air locker before so there is a chance that I miss it up.

Good news? All parts are locally available. The only thing that I'm not sure of is the bearing kit for the front Dana 44. I'm not sure that a standard kit will fit a Rubicon Axle. Of course, this setup will give me one hell of a car. But I don't feel that my skills are up to it yet.

So guys, what do you think I should do??

[MalteJK]

I'd go for option 2. But i'd upgrade to 4,88 if you want to upgrade to 33x12,5 .
You will need the extra punch

[SSS]

I'd go for option 2. But i'd upgrade to 4,88 if you want to upgrade to 33x12,5 .
You will need the extra punch

hmmm ... i thought he has a manual!?

4.88 is only needed/perfect for 33x12.5 if you have the newer (2004+) 42RLE with 0.69 final 4th gear/OD ratio.
And with the 3spd auto 4.88 is toooo low too ... he will turn quite some RPMs at 120kmh

[MalteJK]

I'd go for option 2. But i'd upgrade to 4,88 if you want to upgrade to 33x12,5 .
You will need the extra punch

hmmm ... i thought he has a manual!?

4.88 is only needed/perfect for 33x12.5 if you have the newer (2004+) 42RLE with 0.69 final 4th gear/OD ratio.
And with the 3spd auto 4.88 is toooo low too ... he will turn quite some RPMs at 120kmh

oops sry you're right !
4,1 is quit good.



i don't know why i was looking for automatic

[ossme]

I'd go for option 2. But i'd upgrade to 4,88 if you want to upgrade to 33x12,5 .
You will need the extra punch

well, TOO LATE !!

I decided that since My tires are new that I'm going to 4.11 for now and re-gear to 4.56 later once I change the tires.

Since I'm going to change the gears and carrier, I decided to add an ARB locker and Twin compressor as well.

[ossme]

I'm making this post my "official" RB building thread! So, Please expect updates from time to time.

This week Updates ?

I replaced my BFGoodrich tires with DickCepek Baja Crusher!

IMG_0734.JPG

IMG_0739.JPG

... but wait, You thought that I didn't see Mud Tires as a good option in sand? Yes, I still think So! But those are not actually mud tires despite what every body is saying !

I will be writing a full review about these tires after my next trip. But for know, I'm happy with what I got!

[SSS]

yeah ... those are "rock paddles"
bad axx man, bad axx!

[Sean]

Nice...

[MalteJK]

Congratulations ... let's hear about the performance, soon

[Xof]

i live your new tires, but i also love your old ones...