Cheap Jeep Returns / Ultimate Axle Show! - Top Shop Challenge

Today, if they build it, you will go some of the Midwest's best off road truck builders compete in a five stage shoot out all to see who's crowned top shot. Plus Dana corporate Ford and Rockwell. It's axel's +101 right now on Xtreme 4x4.

Hey guys, welcome to Xtreme 4x4. And today we have a show that I know all of you are gonna love because it's a topic that all of us hardcore off roaders need to know about and that is axles.

We put a lot of vehicles on the show and there's one thing that all four by fours have in common.

Ales, two of them

and preferably two strong ones that can handle the abuse.

Now, how much abuse you put your truck through. All depends upon what you're going to do with your truck.

Now, you guys probably remember our 85 Jeep CJ seven that we affectionately called the Cheap Jeep. It started with a spring over axle conversion, some bead locks and a complete set of

Boers. And then we swapped out the manual transmission for an automatic transmission and rebuilt the transfer case with a 4 to 1 gear set,

all the while knowing that our days were limited with those axles.

Now, the first axle we're going to look at today can be found underneath the back end of almost all jeeps since 1976 it's called an A MC 20

it's easily identified by the perfectly round diff cover. It's usually bolted on with torques, head bolt straight from the factory. Now, this axle has some inherent strengths as well as some weak points. The strengths are the fact that has an eight and three quarter inch ring gear as well as 29 flying axle. So it's pretty strong.

The weak points are out here on the tubes themselves rather small as well as very thin walled and the shafts themselves come from the factory as two piece units with an outer flange where the wheel bolts on and that is usually the failure point. So when a stock Jeep, the A MC 20 usually does pretty good. But when you start to modify your truck for serious off road duty, that axle becomes your weak link and you gotta get it out

under the front of this Jeep 75 and newer CJ and a handful of other makes and models

you find the data 30.

Now, this actually comes with a 7.2 inch ring

here and is available with standard rotation or low opinion

and

reverse rotation or a high opinion option.

The most commonly count is 27 on both the shafts and the ST

shafts which makes it a weak link right along with the most broken part

that you join.

Now, over all this day, 30 is not that bad of an axle. As long as you're driving it with a fairly stock jeep no more than 33 inch tires and you're not that heavy on the throttle pedal.

Now, the next axle we're gonna take a look at is a little bit stronger and it's the Dana 44 and you can find this axle under almost any four wheel drive truck built in North America, both front and rear. Now, since the mid 19 seventies, they've had 30 sply inner shaft and 19 sply outers. And they've always had an 8.5 inch re

gear for good strength. They're easily recognizable by the Dana shaped cover and they can be found in most junkyards and off road guys love them. They love

because it's easily converted to high steer. The driver's side knuckle is already drilled and tapped with these studs and you can simply machine the passenger side knuckle to match. You have an easy high steer kit. Now, when you're hunting around the junkyards, don't get excited when you see eight lugs and think you found a day of 6040 fours had them too. The best thing to do is to look right at the housing and you'll see the 44 cast right into the back.

This will be a great axle underneath the front of our Jeep

and four

took the Dana 44 a little bit further. They went ahead and just use the center section in what they called a twin traction beam. It was their first shot at ifs

was basically a 44 housing with these little stub shafts running out to the axles and the whole unit would move on lace bris. Now, although the hard core off rotor doesn't really use this very often.

I have seen these in a couple of tough truck trucks where the guys had an independent front suspension, that way they could have the strength of a solid axle.

Actual gurus know that there's other data models that were not talking about.

But today, we're concentrating on the most popular and the ones that are easily confused like our

ax

on our bottom draw.

It was originally ordered for the poison spider as a dina 60. But as soon as we open the death,

we found out that it was a day of 50.

Now, these

ales are most commonly used on the front of the newer after 250

we can speak for hours trying to figure out why Ford took the Bey

Dana 60 housing

and installed a day 44 carrier ring opinion.

But whatever the reason is, you're going to want to stray away from this axle for serious off road use.

You might look at it and say those beefy knuckles in those large joints make that axle strong. But in all actuality, the axle tapers down right when it goes into the carrier, making it the weak link and you can go ahead and try and upgrade those axles. But in turn, you're just going to be making your gear set the weak link.

Now, the axle

in the family but

hard core off rotors will pretty much consider top of the food chain will be the Dana 60 like the one in the back of the poison spider.

Although Dana did build the larger and stronger Dana 70 that you'll find in diesel powered pickup trucks or dual rear wheel trucks. The downfall is, is this thing is stronger because of the size of the ring gear. It's 10 and three quarter inches big.

Now the housing has to be a lot larger to keep that ring gear and has extra bracing on the bottom.

And guys are finding that the ground clearance they're giving up to run. The 70 is not worth the small extra strength. They're getting

the data 60 is easy to identify just like all the other ones because of the shape of the cover comes the nine and three quarter inch ring gear and ship stock with either 30 or 35 sply axles. Now, there is an id stamping into one of the axle tubes and you can usually decode that through a bunch of different decoders on the internet and it's a good idea to do that because believe it or not, some of the sixties actually shipped with Detroit lockers and 35 spine axles from the factory.

Now, the data 60 is a full floating axle, which means that we can remove the axle itself without removing the tire and the wheel. It's great on the trail because if you break an axle, simply remove the perimeter bolts, pull it out and you can slide on a spare and continue with your day. Now,

the front data 60 just like the model 3044 did come as either a low, a high pinion as you guys have figured out by. Now, you want that high pinion when you're off road

there

to spot in a junkyard because they're the only data that measures a true four inches across the outer stub shaft cover.

So to summarize with axle tubes, 3.125 inches around and half an inch thick, huge support in the aftermarket with lockers covers and knuckles. Not to mention gear ratios available from 354 to 717.

The Dana 60 axles are great to abuse off road.

Talk about abuse. These guys break them and rebuild them on a daily basis. Find out which team is crowned, top shot, stay tuned.

So who builds the toughest rigs? Who's the fastest, most skilled driver? Well, you gotta admit that most of us go form

and just for fun, but we want to be the best at whatever it is we do. And when we heard the Rockport off Road Park put together a course to challenge all the region shops. Well, we had to check it out for ourselves

off road shops representing Illinois, Indiana and Missouri came to Hannibal Rocks

all for the right to be crowned the top shop.

Well, this is the toughest event in the Midwest. Over two days, the teams competed in five treacherous events. They put us through some of the hardest courses. Lots of carnage, lots of rocks, everything you can expect. It's a real tough one.

They had to endure the brutality of the mud. Bob a truck pull the nasty metal crunching techno,

a

gun it and go time run

and the final event of the competition. A black Diamond rock crawl. This is really a hard core event. At the end of the second day, the team with the highest score would be crowned champion. Oh,

I'd love to be called the top shop for just

something to brag about first up. I like mud.

The truck that went the furthest through a foot of mud would win the weekend's dirtiest event.

You have to get through the butt bug. You need lots of speed and horsepower. That's about all it takes. Tom's

repair was the defending top shop champs and Brad Beamer wasn't going to let his team down.

I got a lot of confidence should be good. Brad moved to the head of the pack. When he nailed a distance of 135.2 ft,

all you had to do is keep it to the floor and let Jeep do the work. Stan, the man Haynes heads team Brannock. He knows anything short of the victory is failure. The pressure is pretty intense, gotta perform. It's what I intend to do.

Stan's second place finish, made his team proud.

That's perfect. He sets the bar for the entire event.

We couldn't have asked for anything more on him. He did great

bel repair the shop and Axle Boy racing rounded out the top five

from the mud to the rocks for the technical trail from 1 to 5. This is a five compared to what we've been on to in the past. It's called a technical run. And I mean, that's what it is. It's technical. You gotta think about it. You got place rocks, you gotta make the right move. After finishing last in the mud. Team, axel boy needed to make up some points. Looks pretty tough and we haven't tested the jeep out. So I don't, we'll see what it does.

Scott Carline didn't do much and Axel Boy ended up with another fifth place finish

when it comes to rocks. Pro crawler. Chris Injuries was the shop's secret weapon.

The technical, the trail, I got a twin stick transfer case so I can front dig,

which really helps me maneuver around on the course. That's exactly what Chris did easily taking the win ahead of Tombs Repair. And

the day's final event wasn't for Sissies. The stage is a time trial. Get to it as the fastest time possible. Floor it, skinny pedal and nail it.

Tombs Repair. Put all three rigs in the event. As Brad Beamer's 37 2nd run, put them on top of the leaderboard.

Not to be outdone was axel boys, Rodney Werde

Hausen

showing no fear he matched the fastest time.

That was awesome, man. I can't believe we tied for first place all

time trial. That was just awesome though. Axel

boy also ran three trucks

and Rodney's teammates gave the squad the tiebreaker victory

with one win and two second place finishes.

Tombs led the event after day one.

Holy cow. I got to tell you

that is one heck of a day one.

Now make sure you stick around because coming up next is day two of the top shop challenge includes the truck,

the rock

and of course you get to find out who the winner is.

We're back on extreme where we're headed back to Rockport Illinois for day two of their top shop challenge

throughout the night. All the teams worked feverishly on their trucks to be ready for day two. We'll work all night, all day, whatever it takes to get the trucks to get on the trail again. It doesn't matter. We're all in it for the same reason. With only the pull and the rock crawl remaining last place. Bever repair. We're already out of the title hunt.

It a

dis

we come out here and play with them. It's all fun.

Starting off day two was the truck ball. We've got a 14,000 pound mechanical sled normally used for many rod crackers. What this does? It tests the strength and the durability of these rigs, their ability to recover another rig off of a trail or something

without breaking,

leading the shot by just nine points. John Toombs wasn't going to crack under the pressure. I feel real good. We got our repairs done last night. We got a good breakfast this morning and

we're full of energy.

Credit the Wheaties as tombs hammered out an amazing 191 ft hole tombs all the way, baby. Then no,

Nick kept the shop's title hopes alive with his 183 ft pole.

I couldn't feel any better. I love it. This is what it's all about right here. Heading into the final event. The title would come down to two heavy weights, Tombs Repair and the shot.

This is the rock crawl. This is the last stage. This is it. This is the meat potatoes, man. This is what's gonna separate them all the whole weekend comes down to this crawl. Go passenger and keep bringing it.

Tombs would have one rig entered in the event

while the shop would send in three, they could drop the lowest score,

they could take it all just because of the way they played the strategy. First up for the shop was Ben Melman.

He left on the hook. I wanted to finish that course more than anything. The shop's Mike Jones was next. It is nerve wracking using standard rock crawling rules. He cleared the chorus with a score of two.

I had a hard time driving this. There's a lot of foot pedals and steering going on for the team. It all came down to pro Crawler, Chris Andres. I really need the Aces course.

I need to give us a negative store. So we are in first place and really put a bunch of pressure on the other team hit gate and a couple of backups gave him

a

score of one to win the top shop for Tombs. All Alan Grady needed was a 10 or better. He had a really good score and Tombs is gonna come out first place. Second is just a year. It wasn't pretty, but his score of 10 gave Tombs a slim margin of victory. So we did a good job all weekend.

Our whole team pulled together.

There you go.

Now, obviously, we want to say congratulations to all the guys at Tom's Repair for a job well done.

And so far today, we've shown you all the popular axles that are available from the Dana Corporation, but there are other axles out there and that's where we're gonna go. Now, we're gonna start with the corporate 14 bolt. Now, this rear axle comes in two types. There's a full floating and a semi floating and it's a very strong axle with a 10.5 inch ring gear and 30 sply shafts that they can.

Now, it's easy to identify because the cover has exactly 14 bolts in it. And like the DANA, it did come with a Detroit locker right from the factory.

Now, you can find the full floater in the junkyard pretty easy. All you gotta do is crawl underneath

and look for this removable pinion support. If you can pull the hubcaps off the truck, and you should also find the bolts holding the axle shaft itself. You always want that full floater, not the

clip version. And the reason why

on a semi floating axle, the vehicle's weight is actually supported by the axle shaft. And when they make these shafts, the shafts have to be able to bend under that vehicle's weight. Whereas on a full floater, the vehicle's weight is just supported by the tire and wheel and the housing, it doesn't have to bend. It could be made stronger

and you do give up some ground clearance for the 14 bolts, but you can very easily cut the bottom off this housing and rebuild it

and get that ground clearance back. And that is termed as shaving your axle

up next, the granddaddy of them all rockwells when Xtreme 4x4 continues,

welcome back to a talk on Xtreme 4x4.

Probably the easiest

ale to identify is always going to be the 49 inch with its removable third member that houses the ring and pinion. This a

most commonly found in three quarter ton for trucks and V and

with its 28 and 30 flying

ale shafts that are held in place with bear supports right at the flange.

This

Ale is not a full floater axle, but it does have benefits over the standard sea CLP axle because if that shaft breaks, it's actually not gonna fall out of the housing because it's sandwiched in right here at the flange. Now with the removable carrier and its inherent strength of the nine inch ring gear, which is where the axle gets its name. This is a very common axle for racers because you can go ahead and have a bunch of different center sections that are already set up with different gear ratios lockers and then you can go ahead and swap them out on the fly all depending upon track conditions.

Now, you didn't think we're gonna have an axle show and not talk about the ultimate in original equipment, steering axle, the 2.5 ton top loading, Rockwell. Now, these are most commonly found underneath the front end of old military trucks. And the only way to describe these things is big beefy and borderline indestructible and we're not gonna go into them too deep. Now, I just tell you that they got a 6.7

2 to 1 gear ratio. It'll make them great for off road, but we're gonna be rebuilding these later on the season and slipping them underneath one of our projects. Now, what project is that gonna be?

You guessed it? The bottom drawer buggy is getting an actual upgrade. Plus the cheap cheek will be back for a cut down 44 as well as a cut down 60

they'll both be ready for the trail. We'll see you next week. Thanks Lou.