Jon Erickson

Greetings,

For those who like to cut to the chase feel free to drop to the last sentence in my post. I asked this question in the jeep forums but folks here might have more info seeing as you're specialists in all things Cherokee. I have been working on resurrecting a 2WD 02 GC with a 4.0L and 42RE trans for a friend. The Jeep seemed to be well cared for up to a point. There is a stack of papers showing that most of the prior owners cared for their baby but the last owner owned it for a short time before getting rid of it and did nothing. I am fixing the things he ignored and damage he caused. One such item is a dana 35 that was run for over 6 months with an odd sized tire. The rear howls under part throttle and the gear oil was about the nastiest I've ever changed so I'm fairly certain that the pinion bearing is lunch at the very least. The ring and pinion are slowly cutting a new pattern so eventually they will go pop.

I do not have the tools to do a rebuild on this D35 so I am looking at a few options.

1. A full rebuild of the current diff by a pro including a new ring and pinion to the tune of 1200.00

2. A D44 with limited slip out of a scrapped low miles 04 4x4 V8 GC.

3. A D35 open diff out of a scrapped high miles 02 4x4 4.0 GC

I personally would prefer the D44 pull but since the 04 is a 4x4 I assume that driveshaft is shorter and I've already been warned that the u-joints are bigger so a swap would possibly require a custom driveshaft to connect the trans and diff back up. To do this economically I would like to swap the u-joint yoke from the D35 over to the D44 and reuse the original driveshaft. Has this been done or is it possible?

dave1123

You're got several things working here. Admittedly, the D44 would be a better choice, but you'll have to check if the pinion portion is longer than the D35, that is will it require a shorter driveshaft to connect? The different size u-joint yokes can be fixed with special u-joints that have different size bearing cups on the cross, 2 for the smaller one and 2 for the larger one. If you change the yoke on the diff, you'll have to reset the pinion pre-load, which takes finesse to do it right. You can also build a custom driveshaft. I did it on a Chevy truck. My THM 350 blew up and I got a 200R4 from an Oldsmobile free. It required a 3.5" longer driveshaft so I bought a drive tube and welded the ends I needed to it. I had to align the plane of the 2 yokes perfectly on a surface plate, then spotweld them in place, doublecheck alignment and length, then Migweld it all the way around by rolling it on a table. I didn't even balance it and it was fine up to 75 mph without vibration. OR you can get a custom shaft made. To start with, check the length of your pinion from yoke to axle centerline, then measure a D44 the same way. If the difference is only an inch, just use a special u-joint.

My 2000 4.0 WJs D35 rear axle grenaded on me because the carrier housing split at 210K miles. My mechanic bought a used axle on-line for $550, guaranteed for 90 days and had it in 2 days. It's out of a low mileage 03. It only took him 8 hours to change it. Now my D30 is starting to whine at 225K miles. Apparently, the t/case took a shot because it won't go back into 2wd and I've been driving it in 4wd full time for awhile. Probably a bent shift fork. I'll fix that in the spring.

4.3L XJ

Personally, I would go with the used D44. I haven't checked on the D44A, but the regular D35 and D44 pinion yoke will interchange. The regular D44 and 35 pinion shaft is the same too. It is too bad I don't have the WJ wreck here or I could measure for you. But if I know auto manufacturers and Dana at all, they would want to conserve parts and would want to be able to run stuff that would interchange easily on the assembly line

dave1123

Oh yeah! I forgot about that. Jeep never used a D44. They are all D44a with the aluminum center section. The case is much larger than the D44 and doesn't even use the same parts or gears. There isn't a large selection of aftermarket parts for the D44a either. In high stress situations, the differential case tends to stretch and change gear lash and wear out bearings. That's one of the reasons you see them with trusses to keep the case from bending and the axle tubes from separating from the diff case.

If you don't believe me, take a look at aftermarket suppliers of gearsets and parts for the 44a. I believe the 44 was only used in Dodge trucks with leaf springs and maybe some xjs.

Don't forget the WJ uses a 3 link suspension and coil springs.

Jon Erickson

I'm swapping WJ to WJ and within the same release run to keep the ABS pains to a minimum. (2002 - 2004) I thought that the 44 was iron and not aluminum. Ugh, the things people hide with spray paint... There are 12 wrecked WJs most with the axles intact at my local pick and pull so I should be able to measure to my hearts content between the 35 and 44. They're just all 4WD which is what had me worried about joint size mismatches. For the owners future sanity sake if the joints don't match up I may just rebuild the 35 or pull another 35 and leave the 44 for someone who will actually use it assuming that the aluminum isn't warped. An aluminum rear diff on a 4x4? Really?!!! I'm all for weight savings but there are some things that just shouldn't be lightened.

dave1123

Registration weight of my 2000 4.0 WJ cheap Laredo is 3980 lbs. You might as well call it 2 tons! I think my 89 Chevy 4x4 was 4600 but I'm not sure. The heaviest car I've ever driven was a 55 Chrysler New Yorker 4dr hardtop convertible at 5750 lbs. That thing was a tank! With a hemi!

Pushing 2 tons with a D35 is a bit stupid, I think! I've had loads of around 1500 lbs in it before.

4.3L XJ

Now you have hit on why they fail. They are not a bad axle if you don't overload them. Rated at 2750#, half of that 4K is pushing it. Put it on a hill and try to accelerate and you have exceeded its rated load capacity. Those axle work OK in a lighter rig. (Don't hate, I have a non C clip locked D35 that has lasted for 9 years on the rocks) It is just as stupid to put a axle no matter if D30 'r D44 with 30 outers in the heavy end JKU that weighs just about the same