Axle swap for my 95 ZJ limited V8
 

Brand new to this site and somewhat brand new to jeeps. I picked up a 95 jeep ZJ and i am currently building it for off road and some climbing. It has stock axles that i want to swap out. I was told to do a ford 9" in the back and a dana 44 for the front. Just looking for some advice on this as i dont know what year or model to take them off of. I dont have tons of money to buy new axles but im good buying new housings and then building them as i work on the engine and body mods. Any info would be greatly appreciated Thanks!!!

I'm not into ZJ's so don't know much about them. I do know from screwing around with CJ's that Ford 9 inch and Dana 44 are good stuff.

What size tires do you plan on using? A high pinion Dana 30 out of an XJ and a Ford 8.8 out of an Explorer are both pretty cheap and will hold up to 35s.

Any of the half ton pickup 9" rear ends will do. The D44 has to be the early pickup or full size Bronc D44s, preferably without the cast in radius mount. But if it does have that, you can replace the tubes. It will take a few bucks and an auto machinist with a hefty press. But to do this swap you will need to fabricate brackets and coil buckets or buy them from someone like Ruff Stuff or many other suppliers of builder parts. And of course you will need to be able to weld all that stuff on

Not sure. Going back and forth between 35s and 37s

You are going to need a lot of lift to run 37s on a ZJ

35s are my go to. id like to see if 37s will fit with all the room i made with cutting the fenders and opening up the wheel wells. Also going to run a 7" iron rock or Claytons long arm kit

I think 35s are as big as yo can go on a ZJ. That is all the fender wells will accommodate. There is a possibility you could go to 37s, but you would need really wide axles to do it and cut the fenders out on the outer part of the body and make tube fenders that extend to the bulkhead that runs along the pinch seam front and back.