Keeping The Wheels Rolling
My axle swap
When I bought my Wagoneer it came with stock '77 axles. In other words Dana 44 front and rear. It also came with a very high 3,07 gearing so the first thing I had to do when I changed tire size from the stock 28" to 33" was a gear change. I installed 3,73 gear to avoid changing the carrier. This worked fine for the 33's but where a bit too high for the 35's I later installed. I also installed Lock-Right lockers in the axles.This setup served me well for many years, and I still feel that the Dana 44's with stronger axle shafts is more than strong enough for a Full-Size Jeep. However when I at last decided to go on with my custom coil-spring setup I didn't want to do all the work to my D44's only to find out that I could break them after all. And there's nothing wrong with some slight OVERKILL. |
|
Finding the Right Stuff
I wanted something unbreakable under my Wag so I began the search for Dana 60 axles front and rear. This proved to be harder than I've imagined. One option was to by axles from companies like Boyce or Currie. But both the price and shipping costs from the US made that a bad plan. So it had to be found somewhere I could pick them up myself. At first I found a D60 rear axle from a Dodge van, only to find out (after I paid for it of course) that most D60 rear's came with a 1,31" 30 splined axle shaft. This was the same size as my D44 and not what I wanted. And finding a D60 front axle in Norway was nearly impossible at the right price. It almost looked as I had to buy a Dodge 1 ton truck just to get the axles I wanted......
Then I got a called from a guy that had just what I was looking for. He had two D60's that was overhauled and made ready for a coil-sprung project. The rear had a custom disc brake convertion and both had ARB air-lockers and 4,56 R"&"P. I really wanted 4,88 R"&"P's but this was close enough. They had also been prepared for 15" wheels. The front axle have had the knuckles cut and turned for proper caster and pinion angle. I got the axles and the Old Man Emu coil springs for a fair price.
When I got the axles in my garage the first I had to do was to remove the brackets the previous owner had installed to make his coil-spring project work. I had hopes for that at least some off them could be used for my project, but I had to start from scratch. The axles where rebuilt and the ARB's installed so this part I could leave alone. Well, almost. I couldn't sleep well at night without tearing them apart to see if the rebuild had been done right :-) Then all I had to do was making the brackets I needed to install the axles under the wag together with the custom 4-link rear suspension and the Range Rover front suspension. I also had to modify the steering linkage on the front.
Steering
I wanted to have the steering linkage as high as possible to avoid damage and I also wanted to use rod-ends instead of the original ball-joints. Making steering arms for my front D60 was easy because the cup for the preload spring is fastened with four bolts on top off the knuckle and the arms can be safely fastened there without the need for tapping new bolt holes. I had my arms laser-cut out of 1"stainless steel. I also corrected the ackerman angle at the same time because the axle came from a truck with longer wheelbase than the Wagoneer. The tie rod are connected below the arms and the connecting rod are connected at the top. I also had to make some slight bends on the connecting rod to ease the angles at rod ends at full axle drop
The connecting and tie rod are made from 1 5/16" steel tubing with 5/16" wall tickness so they should take some beating if something should reach high enough to hit them. With the raised location the tie-rod are 4" higher than stock and with 38,5" swampers they are 22 3/4" above the ground. The rod-ends are national chrome-moly 3/4" . I use the original pitman arm bored out to use rod-ends.
So far the servo pump and steering box are the original GM pieces that came with the Wag, but I'd like to install some form off hydraulic steering like the Rock-Ram that AGR manufactures to aid the steering.
Brakes
The front brakes are the original D60 13 inch disc brakes, I think the are capable of stopping much bigger rigs than my Wagoneer. The front caliper are ground down so it's possible to use 15" wheels, but I use 16,5" because I made a great deal on some slightly used 38,5" Super Swampers TSX's. When it's time for new rubber I will change to 15" for their better safety bead and much greater availability. (unless I get another great deal) In the rear there is a custom disc convertion using Ford calipers with built-in parking brakes. This was something the previous owner of the axles had installed so I don't have much information on this except the orgin off the parts.
The rest of the braking system where upgraded with new brakelines and since I now have 4-wheel discs and the original are a disc/drum system, I also had to do something about the valving. I could always just throw away the orginal combination valve and use a simple tee for the front and a adjustable propotional valve for biasing the rear brakes, but I wanted to keep the warning switch for safety. I disected the combination valve and removed the front metering valve and the rear propvalve. This leaves me with a junction block with the warning switch. For balance between the front and the rear I found a load-sensitive valve from a MB Gelenderwagen and modified it to adjust with a hex bolt.
Both my booster and my master cylinder where toast so I needed new parts. I first thought I could use a dual-diaghram booster from a J20 truck, but then I decided to use a GM hydraboost setup from a Suburban. I got the booster and master cylinder from a 1991 sub. To make this work I had to modify the rod that connects to the brake pedal and drill some new holes in the bracket to the firewall. The hydraboost came with the newer o-ring connections, while my OEM has ordinary flares. The solution was to have a hydraulic shop make "new" hoses from the ones I had. The power steering pump has got an additional tank for more oil volume and a oil cooler. The brakes turned out to be incredible..............
 |
|
With all this sorted out it was time to move on to the coil-spring setup
Questions ?
Home Offroad Onroad Plans Tech Myself Links Gallery
Misc Music MAIL ME
Suspension
Engine
Transmission
Transfer
Body Interior Axles Air-Supply