2024 full float axle strength/pricing?

[Joaquim]

Far enough! To clarify…

I do a lot of different Jeeping. I use it as my daily driver, it covers a lot of trails, and it rock crawls to the fullest capacity it is built for (it can’t keep up with Flex, Rocks, and Rollovers on YouTube). I have it built with a ProRock Dana44 fron’t with RCV shafts and factory Dana 44 rear. It is geared in 4.56 because it started as an Xtreme Recon. It has full belly skids and full MetalCloak 3.5” suspension system/lift.

I do not Jeep with other people 90% of the time. If I do, it is with one friend and only during the summer months when he has his TJ out on the road. Otherwise he is in the Jeep with me or its my wife. I have zero desire to be sitting in a park full of trails waiting my turn. There is a lot great terrain in NH that you can find.

That means if the R&P strips, the knuckles go, or something otherwise catastrophic, I am likely not getting out of there. I run the rig on 37s. And as much as I would LOVE 40s, I do not feel personally like I would want to take on the risk of failure by running them on D44 gears. I would want the much larger R&P provided by D60 axles or bigger.

There are a lot of different things that can go wrong out in the woods. My preference would be that it is something less catastrophic than a differential so that I have a higher chance of rigging it together and getting out.

The jeep will hopefully end up on 40s at some point, but that means new axles, hydro, drive shafts, etc before wheels and tires get added.

I hit a huge hole in a dirt road that was covered by snow last winter going about 10mph and it bounced the Jeep hard enough to bend the axle housing slightly. Freak accident. I was lucky it didn’t snap a tie rod end either and that it only bent one. It doesn’t take much to go wrong.

Does this mean 3.45 is less likely to break?

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[CarbonSteel]

Isn't m220 8.7 inch vs m200 8.5 inch?

220 millimeters = 8.661 inches

200 millimeters = 7.874 inches

 

[CarbonSteel]

Does this mean 3.45 is less likely to break?

Possibly, but it for the reasons one might think. More likely because Jeeps running 3.45 ratios are not modified like 4.10+ ratios are and therefore are not exposed to the same abuse or loads the higher ratios are.

 

[word302]

I run heavy bead lock wheel on 37s.

The first pinion gear failed while I was pulling out of our camp spot up north in Michigan to go wheeling.

The second pinion gear failed while I was cruising in the desert, think flat smooth road. The Boarder Patrol will drive it at high speeds and it is very smooth. I could easily cruise it at 60+ mph smooth.

Because they failed during times of "normal" type of use and not during times of high load/high stress like a bind during rock climbing, I think that it is a gradual effect of long term use causing the failure.

It seam as though I get about 40,000 miles out of a set before they break. Mind you I put them through extreme use. I have towed our camper 48,000+ miles and the Jeep is off road for thousand and thousands of miles. It see many 16 hour days of driving and many 10 hour days off the road. The month of Jan, Feb, and March, we off roaded four to six days a week for the three months. We also rarely use a bypass on the trail.

I suspect that very few would put their Jeep through the type of use that my Jeep has seen. Think jumped it 5 feet in the air, water over the hood, deep mud, huge rocks, and so on for day, weeks, and months on end. With that said, I do have the philosophy of treat it like a race car, maintain it like a race car. It get oil changes, diff fluid changed and general maintenance very often. Tire rotations every 5,000 miles, suspension checks often with bolts checked for proper torque and so on.

So the Dana 44 is not just eating the rear pinion gear with 5.13. I have had the locker positioning sensor fail twice on the locker. I have had the magnetic ring in the locker fail twice also. I have bought two Dana 44 axles (new in the crate) to scavenge parts off it as they were not available to buy separately. Of course those locker parts failed each time a week or so before I was leaving on a month or two wheeling trip. So my only option was to buy the axle. I left December for a four to five month wheeling trip with a non functioning locker because I could not buy a 60 axle intake before I left and could not sensor replacement kit was backorder and would not come in before well left.

With talking to Dynatrac, they are under the assumption that I may have tweeted the axle just enough that it causes undue heat and stress causing the electronics to fail more often and to create addition stress on the gears when used under extreme loads. Think wheeling in Moab for 30+ days straight.

So in March, I had a new set of 5.13 gears installed, when I get home, I will replace the current Dana 44 axle with the one I have in a crate. That crate axle is missing the magnetic ring for the locker, but the sensor kits has came in to fix the locker, the crate axle will get truss added to it and it will get re-geared to 5.13 gears.

I just consider all of this as the cost of using the Jeep to off road thousand and thousand of miles.

Seems like tons would’ve cost way less in the long run. This is exactly why I won’t spend any more $ on the 44s other than the regear that I did myself. If when they break they’ll get replaced with tons. If I’m ready for long arms and 40s before they break they’ll get replaced with tons. These new axles from Dana aren’t going to be worth the hassle to upgrade unless you’re running the D35 and even then it’s gotta be cheap. Otherwise just invest in an axle that’s going to hold up.

 

[wibornz]

Seems like tons would’ve cost way less in the long run. This is exactly why I won’t spend any more $ on the 44s other than the regear that I did myself. If when they break they’ll get replaced with tons. If I’m ready for long arms and 40s before they break they’ll get replaced with tons. These new axles from Dana aren’t going to be worth the hassle to upgrade unless you’re running the D35 and even then it’s gotta be cheap. Otherwise just invest in an axle that’s going to hold up.

a one ton would have been way cheaper. Unfortunately, they are usually at least 12 weeks out. Each time something went wrong with the Dana 44, it was like a week out before we left on multiple month trips. So waiting was not an option. I can locally go buy a Dana 44 crate axle in like five minutes. And it is way easier to buy a $2000 axle prior to a multiple month trip than buy a $10,000 axle prior to a trip.

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