I went with the limited slip because of the amount of snow/ice that we get here in Denver and because my wife will drive this vehicle on occasion. You can’t “turn off” a Powertrax and the ARB lockers are way out of my budget. A high quality limited slip was the answer for us. I decided on the Auburn over the Trac-Lock because of the cone clutch that the Auburn uses. Basically it won’t wear out as fast as the plate clutch in the Trac-Lock, and the Auburn will transfer power even when traction is zero on one wheel! Those are two huge advantages over the factory limited slip.
Here’s the part information:
Auburn Gear High Performance Series Chrysler 8.25" 2.71 & Up 29 Spl.
Part #542074
The cost was $334 from [link=nationaldrivetrain.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/page7.html newwindow]nationaldrivetrain.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/page7.html[/link] No tax, no shipping. With the cost of some gear oil, friction additive, new bearings and races (go to NAPA, not the dealership – saved $96!!!), and having the bearings pressed on the new diff you are looking at right around $400 total.
That being said, THIS IS NOT AN EASY INSTALL. It is not “plug and play” like the Powertrax. You have to remove the factory carrier which means you have to measure and reset the backlash when you install the new diff. It took me and a buddy (thanks Chet!) all day Saturday. If we had to do it over again we could probably do it in about half the time though. We had heavy duty air wrenches and an air powered rotary tool – I would not try this install without them
Step 1 – Jack up the rear end and put it on some jack stands. Make sure you brace the front wheels and put the car in neutral. You will need the drive shaft to spin freely throughout this install. DO NOT engage the parking brake as you will be removing your brakes shortly…
Step 2 – Remove your rear wheels and brake calipers. The directions tell you to remove your disk/drum brakes, but on my 2003 just removing the calipers was all that was needed (we found this out after we had the brakes all the way off).
Step 3 – Drain the pumpkin and remove the diff cover. Go ahead and clean the old sealant off the diff housing and cover now (using the rotary tool this was a piece of cake).
Step 4 – Rotate the drive shaft until you can see the large center diff pin and the small locking nut that holds it in. Remove the nut and pin.
Step 5 – Remove your axles. In order to do this you’ll remove the “c” clips that are holding your axles in the diff carrier. Have one person pull the clips as another stands at the end of the axle and pushes in. You may have to shake the axle a bit to get it to move. When your “c” clips are removed just pull your axles out the end of the axle housing until they’ve cleared the inside of the diff housing. Save the “c” clips as you’ll need them later. Now you can remove the old carrier…
Step 6 – Loosen the small retaining clips that keep your end caps in place. These are the smaller bolts all the way to the left and right of the diff housing. You may be able to take the passenger side one completely off at this point, but the driver side does not have enough clearance.
Step 7 – There are two large brackets which hold the threaded end caps, races, and carrier bearings in the housing (basically these keep the entire diff in place). You’ll see these just inside of those retaining clips you loosened/removed in step 6. Remove the four large bolts and the old diff will just about fall right out. Watch your head.
No turning back now…
If you haven’t already, you’ll need to buy new bearings and races and have the new bearings pressed on the limited slip. If you go to a Jeep dealership they’ll quote you about $45 per bearing and another $20 per race (this does not include pressing them on). Considering you’ll need two of each this can be expensive. Go to NAPA! They have the EXACT SAME parts as Jeep and you’ll get all four parts for $34! Head back to the machine shop and you are looking at about $18 labor to have those pressed on.
If you’re thinking about saving some money by using your old bearings and races…don’t. In my case, the bearings on the old diff were on there so tight that the bearings were destroyed by pulling them off. A typical bearing puller wouldn’t even work. We had to take it to NAPA to use the hydraulic puller. It crushed the old bearing, but at least we got the part number off it!
As long as you’re out, go ahead and pick up 2 quarts of 80W90 NON-SYNTHETIC gear oil, 6 ounces of the friction additive the directions call for, and some RTV sealant to seal up your diff cover. I found all of this at AutoZone for about $15.
Now the fun part…installation.
Step 8 – Grinding. Yep, you read that right. The Chrysler 8.25 is the only application that requires grinding – lucky us. Inside the diff housing you’ll need to take the upper right hand corner down by about .5” in order for the new diff to turn freely. Loosely bolt the new diff in place (just for fit) and turn it slowly. You’ll see right where the contact takes place. Remove the diff and start grinding. It took us about 15 minutes (with a heavy duty air powered rotary tool) including several test fittings. The directions that Auburn provides have a drawing of the exact location that needs to be ground down. Definitely follow the directions here!
Step 9 – Once you’ve completed step 8 (and checked for clearance about 15 times) you will need to clean out the diff housing… THOROUGHLY. You now have all kinds of metal shavings floating around from grinding that corner down. You definitely don’t want that metal in there when you close up the diff.
Step 10 – Remove the ring and pinion gears from the old diff, clean them, and install them on your new limited slip. Keep in mind that the bolts holding on the ring and pinion are LEFT TURNING bolts. Took us a while to figure out why those bolts were so tight!
Step 11 – CLEAN EVERYTHING that you’re even thinking about putting back in the housing – retaining clips, brackets, end caps, bearings, races, and the limited slip.
Step 12 – Get another beer and get ready for some frustration. Now it’s time to put that bad boy in the diff housing and replace the brackets and retaining clips that hold in the end caps. The end caps are threaded so you don’t need to worry about shims, but getting the threads on the end caps and the threaded brackets lined up and adjusted was a S.O.B. – plain and simple. Trying to line up your threads, end caps, bearings, and races while getting your backlash and play into specs IS NOT FUN. It will just take some time and at least two sets of hands.
***IMPORTANT*** The passenger side endcap retaining clip can be put in place AFTER the entire diff is bolted in place allowing for additional small adjustments through turning the end cap. However, due to lack of clearance on the driver side the retaining clip must be in place when you initially put the diff into the housing. Thus, you cannot adjust this side once the diff is in. This is THE KEY to getting the correct amount of backlash and play. You have to be a good guesser on the driver side and then make your small adjustments on the passenger side.
The directions from Auburn suggest a tool from Chrysler to help with the adjustments and so would I. We did it the old fashioned way (guess, remove, guess, remove, guess…you get the picture), but I would look into that tool for adjusting the end caps. In the end we got everything lined up and the backlash and play into specs, but this part of the install had me thinking that I had made a terrible mistake trying to do this myself.
Step 13 – Now that everything is lined up and bolted in place tighten down the endcap retaining bracket bolts...you don't want anything to slip on you now.
Step 14 - Turn the new diff until you see the center pin and locking nut (the new diff comes with its own pin and nut so don’t worry about the ones you removed earlier). Then remove the bolt and pin. Have one person push the axles back into the housing as far as they can while the other replaces the “c” clips. Now give the axles a good outward tug and everything should seat back into place. Replace the center pin and locking nut.
Step 15 – Reinstall your brakes and wheels.
Step 16 – The hard part is over. Now just seal up the diff cover, put in the oil and additive, and start praying that you don’t have any leaks or grinding noises!
After the install I had to drive about 75 miles home from Colorado Springs to Denver. There was never so much as a peep out of the rear end and everything was completely smooth from 0-80mph. If you are looking for on-road manners this diff is completely invisible! I’ll let you know how it works off-road, but I expect it to be somewhat better than the Trac-Lock and not quite as good as a Powertrax No Slip. For my purposes though, this is the best of both worlds.
I don't have any pictures of the new diff installed because it was dark out and I was just wanting to get finished by that point! If you are interested in doing this install yourself then PM me and I can hook you up with part numbers for the bearings, races, friction addiditive, etc.
Posted By Skyjump136
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