Sorry about this because I know that this is a question that gets asked over and over and over again. What my question is I have a 27 spline 8.25 in my truck and I have 33s on it now. I really don't do any crazy off road driving but I was going to upgrade to a 29 spine but if I was already going to do all that work would it be worth it to go with a D44. Thank you

 

Most people will tell you that the Dana 44/8.25 are really close to the same strength. The 44 does have larger shafts and is not a C-Clip but with your 33s and mild offroading, It will hold up fine. I would save your cash/effort and buy something else unless you are planning to get bigger tires and beat it up down the road.

 

Don't do a damn thing unless your going to regear or swap in a locker. In that case, I'd upgrade to 29spl and never look back.

Run it as is and be happy. Carry a spare and some fluid to be safe.

 

29 spline 8.25 will be much cheaper and easier to source.

 

Ok so how it work in my case? I have the same 8.25 but with 4.10s with disc , 27 spline but I also have a 44 with 456 a lockright.

The 8.25 will handle the abuse good, some people have ran the 35 with no problems too beating the crap out of them. The 44 also can be beaten good. They all can break no matter what. Either grenades it's self or breaks a shaft or anything else. The 8.25 is great since you can find the spares easy and run both left and right side so one spare shaft. As the 44 has two different sizes, one a about a 1/2 longer but can make a difference. Both are good axles have aftermarket parts the 44 more but the 8.25 is coming along.

 

The 8.25 you can trip over in any junkyard the xj dana 44 is rare to find today in one.

 

down the road I would like to do gears a locker and 35s and I didn't want to do all that and everytime I offroad have to worry about desroying everything.

 

It depends completely on what you want to do for gearing. If you wanted to keep the 4.10s and discs for example, I would simply sell the 44 (assuming the 8.25 is in good shape of course). Want the 4.56s? swap that **** in there.

 

The 8.25/29 spline with 4.56/4.88 a locker and 35's should work fine for you, I plan on the same setup myself. I'm now running 33x12:50x15"/4.56 gear and Detroit Lockers with zero problems. I have just bought an extra set of Bead lock wheels and now looking for a set of 35's used that I can re-groove for trail use only with very low psi.

If I wanted to upgrade my 8.25 for something really HD I would use D60's and skip the D44's.

 

35's on a 29spline 8.25 and a Detroit here. Put through some serious wheeling. No issues so far.

 

My truck only has 3.07s so it really needs to be re geared and I'm trying to go the best/cheapest way that I can. It seems that would be doing the 8.25 29 swap then gearing that with a locker. Thank you for all the input with my newbie question. I was thinking going with 4.10s because I do light wheeling and it's mostly a DD

 

see that info would have helped in the beginning, so you have a manual then? cheapest and easiest route is find a 97'+ 8.25 rear axle out of a 4.0L auto and any 95'+ front d30 from the same engine/tranny combo and you'll bump up to 3.55 which is plenty for 33"s gearing wise.

d44 and 8.25 are similar but its the aftermarket that makes the d44 shine, thats about it. the d44 has many option like the jana54, larger spline count shafts to run larger tires(37"+) but at that point it would be more wise to swap a 14 or 60 in instead

 

Yea it's a manual sorry about that i guess that would be some important info. That sounds like the best idea for what I have and that could handle 35s down the road if I haven't swapped in a 14 or a 60