If you've ever had a truck project, and I'm guessing most of you have, you know that things do not always go as planned. Due to a front axle knuckle change, a wrong part number ordered, and an unexpected axle shaft surprise, we have still not completely finished the suspension or the axles. And in less than a month we have a bumper building story to get to you in June's issue. Yes, we definitely have some catching up to do, as it's January right now and the whole plan is to get this truck on the road in time for a northwest road trip for some snow wheeling. Hopefully this will be a long winter, but I don't want to take any chances. Besides, I'm guessing Off Road Evolution doesn't want its shop to become Jinxy's semi-permanent new home.
As hurried as we now are, we still need to take one step at a time and make sure everything works correctly, so we don't end up taking more time to fix things we've already done. But this month the truck jinx struck again (why do you think it was named Jinxy?), and the axle builds did not go as smoothly as planned.
For axles, I always had big plans, but after some careful thought I ended up barely deviating from the Dana 44 front and Chrysler 9.25 rear axles that the '94-'01 Dodge 1500s originally came with.
The stock rear 9.25 axle is strong and has a good size ring and pinion and large axleshafts, but it had a C-clip design that I don't like, especially since I'd already blown up two of them. In hindsight, it might have been cool trying to stick some Ford 9-inch ends on the original Chrysler 9.25 housing, get some new axleshafts, and eliminate the C-clip aspect from the axle. But at the time I originally built my current rear axle, I was reading a bunch of magazines that told me I needed a Dana 60 with a 9.5-inch ring gear so I ordered up a Currie Dana 60 housing with 35-spline Superior axle shafts, got Wilwood disc brakes (without the parking brake), some 4.56 gears, and a spool. Using a spool, the non-parking brake disc kit, and a standard Dana 60 housing really kept the cost down. In fact, I believe my total expenditure was less than $2,000 when everything was done. But I quickly grew tired of that spool in my street-driven truck, and I also started to understand how nice parking brakes really were. For this final end-build of Jinxy, I took the opportunity to put an actual locking differential (an Ox locker) in the Dana 60 axle and add a parking brake to my rear disc set up.
The factory Dodge Ram low-pinion Dana 44 front has a standard 8.5-inch ring gear, unit bearings instead of rebuildable hubs, and a Central Axle Disconnect (CAD) two-piece axleshaft design on the passenger side. The CAD has a vacuum-actuated collar that slips over the splines of both axleshafts and engages them together. For years I (and other Dodge and Jeep owners) would have told you that the CAD was the weak link in the axle, but in all the years I've owned this truck I've never had a single failure with it. The most likely thing to go wrong is the vacuum actuation, and a company called Posi-Lok makes a cable-driven actuator that can remedy that. Unit bearings get a bad rap, but they actually have a longer service life than rebuildable hubs. The catch is that unit bearings are throw-away and not rebuildable. But I had already convinced myself long ago that I needed to swap in a front Dana 60 or a '79 Ford high-pinion Dana 44 axle to get rid of my "terrible" CAD axle and unit bearings. For that reason, I had acquired myself a '79 Ford high-pinion Dana 44 housing (thanks, Big Stevie) and some Reid Racing knuckles and Off Road Design billet high steer arms. But two things kept coming into my head: The first being that I was barely ever going to unlock some locking hubs and that I had never had a unit bearing failure (though I had one wear out after about 70,000 miles). The second thing that bugged me was that there are really very few serious brake improvements out there for a standard Dana 44 knuckle, and I had some fancy Stillen calipers on my axle from a brake install years ago. Instead of doing all those modifications and ending up with less braking ability than I had before I started this custom axle, I called Currie up and made a last-minute change to instead meld my original axle and it's knuckles to the '79 Ford high-pinion housing. This would allow me to keep my brakes while getting rid of the CAD two-piece axle that I senselessly feared. Besides that, a lot of money was saved on the front axle build since we were only adding the original outer equipment to a used high-pinion housing, requiring a retubing service. I also had to get some new superior shafts and a ring and pinion set for a high-pinion axle. Still, cost was significantly reduced over building an entirely new axle.
Next Month
We'll hopefully be finished with the suspension and axles, and watching Off Road Evolution craft some beautiful bumpers to fit the lines of this truck. The old bumpers have taken a few good hits and never really turned out the way I wanted due to time constraints and me cheaping out on materials. Stay tuned.
 Originally, I was going to...  Originally, I was going to use a standard 1979 Ford Dana 44 front axle. After deciding to keep my original knuckles, brakes, unit bearings, and outer shafts, I had Currie take the '79 Ford housing and put my original inner Cs and knuckles onto the housing..... |  .....Currie offers a ton of...  .....Currie offers a ton of custom axle services, including retubing axle housings..... |  .....Most Dana 44s have very...  .....Most Dana 44s have very similar knuckles and inner Cs. Unfortunately my '94-'01 Dodge axle has special knuckles unique to the truck. |
 Currie had to machine some...  Currie had to machine some new pieces to jig up and weld my axle together. They had never dealt with this Dodge knuckle and its unique pattern before..... |  .....But now they definitely...  .....But now they definitely have it, in case you are interested in getting your front Dodge axle customized..... |  ......Once the correct tube...  ......Once the correct tube measurements were made and everything was lined up perfectly straight, the inner Cs were welded onto the axle tubes to produce a custom hybrid housing. |
 We picked up the housing from...  We picked up the housing from Currie and got it back to Off Road Evolution in Fullerton, California. Owner Mel Wade personally put our hybrid Dana 44 axle together, starting first by doublechecking that the cover of our Ox locker did in fact fit. Remember that just because the differential fits, it does not always mean that the cover will fit the axlehousing.I decided to go with Ox lockers because I think they are bulletproof and I like their cable actuation for its simplicity. I also had a friend with a good used Dana 44 Ox locker that he was letting me use on a lease-with-option-to-buy. |  After we made sure that the...  After we made sure that the cover would fit, Wade put a spreader on the center section and installed the Ox locking differential. I also had to round up a high pinion gear set since my last axle was a low pinion, negating the possibility of reusing my old gears. |  Wade also reinstalled the...  Wade also reinstalled the original unit bearings and original outer axle shafts. We had Superior Axle make new inner axle shafts since one side had slightly changed (the CAD side), but we stayed with the standard 30-spline shaft size since I am only running 36-inch Dirt Grip tires on this truck and do not plan to go any larger. |
 These red calipers are the...  These red calipers are the primary reason I decided to keep the original outer set up. I am not sure Stillen still carries these calipers, but their large kidney bean-shaped pistons apply a lot of clamping force. If Stillen doesn't still carry these, I believe EGR Brakes and SSBC still have bolt-on kits available. |  The axle was coming together...  The axle was coming together nicely, especially considering the lower cost of the axle build. By the way, if you can tell me what is wrong in this picture, I'll send you an OFF-ROAD license plate. Email Jerrod.jones@off-roadweb.com with the answer. |  Here is an Ox locker with...  Here is an Ox locker with its differential cover and cable lever. It is necessary to use the Ox differential cover since the actuator fork is built into it. This is the Dana 60 Ox locker for the rear axle. |
 We dropped a Spicer 4.56 ring...  We dropped a Spicer 4.56 ring and pinion gear set onto the rear Ox locker to match the front. I was happy to say goodbye to the spool. I'm actually a big fan of spools in the dirt, but they annihilate tires in just a few thousand miles on the street. |  If you are curious about what...  If you are curious about what the internals of an Ox locker look like, I understand because we were too. Here you can see the gear teeth that are engaged when the differential cover's engagement fork is pulled. |  This is Wilwood's Dynalite...  This is Wilwood's Dynalite Caliper Parking Brake Kit. It uses an internal drum brake to hold the inside of the rotor hat. Since I had originally bought Wilwood disc brakes but chosen to save $100 on the non-parking brake disc kit, I was able to reuse my Dynalite calipers (a substantial part of the total kit cost) and just get new drum plates and rotors. |
 The Currie Dana 60 housing...  The Currie Dana 60 housing in the back of this Dodge has Ford 9-inch semifloating ends on it. I ordered the axle like this mainly because it was cheaper, but it has a lightweight advantage as well. This half-ton truck certainly did not need full-floating hubs in the back of it. |  Wade got the drum plates onto...  Wade got the drum plates onto the 4-bolt semifloating housing ends, pushed the Superior axleshafts back into the axle, and bolted down the retaining plates...... |  ......Since I didn't have...  ......Since I didn't have the first clue about what type of cable ends I had, I called up Control Cables Inc to figure out what ends and what..... |
 .....length of parking brake...  .....length of parking brake cable and sheathing I needed to make this kit work with my factory parking brake lever in the cab. |  Since I was still using a...  Since I was still using a modified rear driveshaft and a completely stock front driveshaft, I called J.E. Reel Driveline to get a new rear driveshaft made with 1350 U-joints. I also acquired a JB Conversions fixed-yoke kit to rid the back of my NP231HD transfer case of its dreaded slip yoke design..... |  .....If you've got a 1500...  .....If you've got a 1500 Dodge Ram of this era, remember to order the NP241 fixed yoke kit, because the NP231HD has a four-bolt rear tailhousing (same as the NP241). |
 It was exciting to see the...  It was exciting to see the rear of this Dodge get finished up. It did not have a bunch of billet bling everywhere, nor a bunch of fancy link arms, but we know it will still work really well and suit our needs perfectly. | | |