I have a 2000 jeep cherokee, 4.5 lift, 33s, np242, Hackn tap sye, double cardigan driveshaft with a yoke. I had a tcase drop before but I removed it. I install everything but shims and now I need help figuring out what shims I need to get for the rear axle. i have been getting terrible noises from my tcase and I’m 80% sure this is the problem. Any advice is much appreciated.

Do you have any vibrations on acceleration or deceleration? My pinion is 1 degree lower than driveshaft angle with no issues.
What angles do have now? Post some pics.

Not really and bad vibes, however, I get a terrible clunking noise from 15mph and up, this is the problem I am trying to also sort out.

I’m just wanting to know what size shims I should try out

I’m not familiar with the 242 or a hack n tap but your pinion angle looks pretty good to me. At least in the pics.
I’d measure the angles tho. Even if it was visually off, no way to tell what size shims you’ll need without measuring. Plenty of threads here explain how to figure it out.

So I just removed the front drive shaft and no more noises. However the other night. I tried something else that worked for a little bit. When I installed the hack n tap I also removed the tcase drop it had. And then the noise went came about. So Thej I thought that was the issue so I reinstalled the drop and no more noise, until I went and did some light wheeling and some “drifting” on dirt and then in my way home the noise came back after driving on Asphalt for a bit. Todayi took the drop out again and no more noise? Could a bad front shaft affect the rear angles??

No. A transfer case drop can effect your front drive shaft angle along with the lift. Did you set your caster angle after the lift? I’d ditch the transfer case drop and get the caster straightened out. We’re those pics with or without the drop.


Never mind. Looks like it’s out.
Measure and figure what shims you need if any.
Setting caster is a balancing act. You want as much caster as possible with no driveshaft vibration. Front driveshaft angle takes precedence over caster. Plenty of threads on both.

I took out the front shaft (mind you this was a stock drive shaft from 2000 and it’s been beat to hell) and no more noises after driving aggressively. I think the issues was that when I took the drop out it messed the front shaft angles and that’s what was causing noise. When I look at it just moving it with my hand it was making noises and didn’t feel like the new one I installed. The front axle is also off a 97xj bc I broke mine a while back so I went from a low pinion to a high pinion and got the front shaft cut.

Are you sure that the yoke for the hack and tap is bolted tight and is not moving ?

This for sure. It looks like its bending down in the pics.