NOCARRIER

Hey guys. My front drive shaft AKA propshaft with the CV boots on one end has gone out on me. Its making noise, and needs to be worked on.

I bascially have narrowed down to 3 options:

1) Buy a Tom Woods UJOINT style Shaft

2) Get this kit and do it myself:

http://www.driveshaftparts.com/cv-jo.../prod_430.html

3) Take it down to the local drive line shop and let them fix it for 200 bucks.


I'm leaning toward number 2, but have you guys ever seen a kit like this and would it fix my problem? My jeep is a Daily Driver that I use for snowboarding, not off roading and its not lifted, so I'm not worried about abusing the sucker. Number 1 goal is CHEAP RELIABLE FIX in that order.

Thanks!

--shawn

ol"blue

Choice #2 would be the cheapest alternative. But not the route I took.
When faced with this dilemma on my '97 ZJ I replaced the CV type shaft with the pinion-yoke and u-joint shaft from another year ZJ. It has a slip-joint w/grease fitting in the middle of the shaft.
Both ZJ and WJ use the D30 front axle, so it is likely you can use the same fix as I did and be done with the CV joint permanently, and relatively cheap. JMO

NOCARRIER

Thanks for the advice ol'blue.

I can see why you went that route - u-joints sound like the way to go!

I'm worried that if I rebuild the cv on the drive shaft I will have a similar problem soon, or maybe it will work silently for another 150K. Who knows.

ol"blue

I didn't want to have that problem again on my ZJ.
My '04 Grand (WJ) w/4.7L V8 and the Quadra-Trac II system has the double cardan and u-joint shaft and not the CV type shaft. It has a bolt-on yoke at the t-case and the front diff. How is yours attached at the t-case? Maybe you could use one of these shafts?

NOCARRIER

Hey,

The front of the prop shaft has a longer cv boot that has forward and backward flex as well as side to side:



The part that connects to the transfer case looks like this:



This is the part that is bad on mine. I opened it up last night an its dry as a bone inside.

My theory is that this is the end closest to the ENGINE therfore gets the most force - its prolly getting TWEAKED by the tcase when the energy hits the driveline.

Its 75 bucks for this so I went ahead and ordered one. My front seems fine, but if i have more problems I might shell out the $400 for a nice double u joint.

Also, if you on a SUPER budget - it looks like after prying the top off the gold cover, you could pack it full of grease and hope you get another 10K out of it.... IMHO.

ol"blue

I understand that, but the part that the upper CV bolts to, does it bolt to the t-case out-put shaft? I'm wondering if you could use the same double cardan u-joint shaft that's in my '04 WJ?

concours

Had a stick tear open the front boot on the front drive shaft. I need one ASAP... anybody know where to get one? I've struck out at NAPA, Auto-Zone, eBay, quadratec.... vacation time, urgent to get this rig repaired fast! TIA!

yanky

I did it

ROCK

Your best option is to go to a junk yard and find all the right parts. You can "fix" the CV joint, but it's kind of a waste of time. It will come apart again.

You need the yoke off the t-case(pretty much any Jeep NP case), the yoke off the front axle(pretty much any Jeep D30), and the drive shaft from ether a Grand, or a Cherokee. The u joints will all be the same size so no worries there. You can eliminate both CV joints at the same time, and it will solve all your problems. In fact, I may even have the yoke you need for the case. What case do you have? Im pretty sure it's a 242? You will have to have the shaft lengthened, but that should be about it if you get one with good joints.