I was driving down the road at about 30mph. The whole vehicle started to shake violently and as I pulled over, my drive shaft came out. The drive shaft doesn't look damaged, but part of the transfer case did. This looks like an easy fix as long as I can get the part that broke off. What could have caused this?

 

To get it home, I put it in 4wd and drove it about 1/4 mile. This won't hurt anything will it if I need to drive it somewhere to get it fixed if I can't get it?

 

all your fluid will leak out. Id say if youre going 1-2mi at the most no/little damage will be done, just go slow...
The tailcone is what broke, Id say you pry have a bound up ujoint, or something grenaded in the rear diff..

 

The rear U Joint has a broken bolt. So, I am assuming that the drive shaft got out of balance causing the vibration which very quickly turned into a violent shake as the u joint came apart an freed the rear end of the shaft. The free shaft then shattered the tail cone and slipped off the spline.

The drive shaft is not damaged at all, so this looks like an easy fix, as long as I can get the tail cone. I know I can get the u joint at the local store, but not sure about that tail cone.

 

you might be looking at buying a used Tc ase can take the Tail cone off of that. plus you'll have an extra Tcase for future parts/repairs

 

The drive shaft may look OK to the eye but for extra insurance I'd find a drive shaft shop and have them see if it's still true and balanced. They have some small weights welded to them and I've seen them get knocked off. You'll pull all your hair out trying to find the vibration cause everything still looks good.

 

So, it turns out there was a dent that I didn't see until I wiped it off. I took it to a shaft shop and it is too far out of balance to mess with(at least that's what they said) they said I could find one in a junk yard, they could order one, or they could make one. They could make one cheaper than they could order one and I didn't want to possible get a bad one at a salvage yard, so they made one for me. It was only a 3 hour wait, so that wasn't bad. Cost was just under $250. I also found out that my t-case was damaged where the shaft was wobbling freely and violently after the u-joint gave way. So I found a good one at a salvage yard for $250. I found a shop willing to get all this on for me for about $120 on Thursday. Since I need a vehicle this weekend, I'm jumping on it. So, the whole thing is costing me Between $500 and $600 once taxes are figured in. :-( This bring my total invested cost in the jeep up to almost $2800(including the $1500 it cost me). Not bad I don't think so far.