Broken front differential housing.

jeepetorp · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 2:30 pm

I was going upp a slippery cliff, and got diagonal wheel spin. Well, It is only to use the brake to even out the torque. Yeah right.

I´ve heard that it can cause damage, but this was more than I expected.

rangerd77 · **Joined:** Sat May 03, 2008 10:48 am **Posts:** 512

man i hate reading about these :shock:

, its like that sound of a fork scratching across a plate or nails on a chalk board.

ive been worrried about mine lately, due to the high mileage (mileage) on my KJ. how many miles on yours :?:

jeepetorp · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 3:26 pm

70000 km.

Diggerfreek · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 3:47 pm

wow, that thing grenaded. Are you still with in your warranty period?

Boblemoche · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 3:47 pm

I wonder if the gear tooth broke before or after the housing.

jeepetorp · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 4:12 pm

No warranty, the jeep is 3,5 years old.
Maybe the gear tooth were gone before the house. And that caused the twisted power to brake the house.
But the big question is how to avoid this in the future, stop offroading is not an option.
Maybe a difflock. Thought about OX lockers. But I dont know if it will fit, because the OX has a bigger cover. And that´s where the axle is atashed to the body.

rangerd77 · **Joined:** Sat May 03, 2008 10:48 am **Posts:** 512

you can SFA which every will and has said.

but you can do a DETROIT TRU TRAC and a collar like some have on here, but i think that the collar would just hold the broke pieces in place.

Diggerfreek · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 4:38 pm

as he said, a locker and the addition of a diff collar, how ever, the collar has not been proven to prevent diff failure

Boblemoche · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 4:41 pm

ox lockers wont fit without some major modifications. arb lockers are as strong as ox and they fit the kj.

one thing you coud try that nobody tried before is covering your diff housing with this stuff http://www.weldingtipsandtricks.com/dur ... -rods.html

it seems its more solid than aluminium so you could put mabe a 1/8'' layer on the pinion area to make it stronger. if it works and you add a locker I guess it would be pretty strong

other solution is SFA but thats a little expensive :wink:

Dje Ryu · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 4:48 pm

It wasn't necessarily you applying the brakes that caused it to grenade. I didn't touch the brakes until after mine exploded. As for the collar, someone recently reported blowing up their diff with a collar. As mentioned, it simply held the pieces in place long enough to drive it off trail.

These things almost all look identical when they do explode. Crappy casting or not; identical failures indicate design flaw, to me. Isn't the KK's D30A housing re-designed? How hard would it be to put one in a KJ?

Boblemoche · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 5:17 pm

Quote:

How hard would it be to put one in a KJ?

as hard as making a custom cradle.

Maximum Carnage · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 8:20 pm

So pretty much our two choices are:
ARB lockers or a pricey SFA
That just doesn't sound right???

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 8:23 pm

Maximum Carnage wrote:

So pretty much our two choices are:
ARB lockers or a pricey SFA
That just doesn't sound right???

There are other options but those would make putting a ARB locker in seem cheap,thin again it would make a SFA swap look cheap also.

Diggerfreek · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 8:25 pm

the Aussie locker may be a choice if they ever come up with one for the d30a

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 8:27 pm

Diggerfreek wrote:

the Aussie locker may be a choice if they ever come up with one for the d30a

Aussie has a warning on there web page about using there lunchbox lockers in the KJ's front diff,they already make ones for a D30,they will blow up easier with the Aussie.

Inc · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 10:28 pm

That aluminum wed stuff looks cool but I doubt it is strong enough to make the diff less likely to break. Only one way to find out.

greenrider · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 10:46 pm

I had mine explode last week.Washed under the jeep to get mud out from under it and took it to the dealer. Yahoo covered under 5 yr /100,000 km power train. The Liberty is covered till Oct 2011. I bought the jeep in Oct 2004 and it has 76,000 km`s on it now. They never said anything about the larger tires or the 2.5 inch lift.

Diggerfreek · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 11:13 pm

tjkj2002 wrote:

Diggerfreek wrote:

the Aussie locker may be a choice if they ever come up with one for the d30a

Aussie has a warning on there web page about using there lunchbox lockers in the KJ's front diff,they already make ones for a D30,they will blow up easier with the Aussie.

I didn't really look at their site

jsc7002 · **Posted:** Sat Dec 27, 2008 11:20 pm

try the DTT

KJ04 · **Posted:** Sun Dec 28, 2008 11:29 am

jeepetorp wrote:

No warranty, the jeep is 3,5 years old.
Maybe the gear tooth were gone before the house. And that caused the twisted power to brake the house.
But the big question is how to avoid this in the future, stop offroading is not an option.
Maybe a difflock. Thought about OX lockers. But I dont know if it will fit, because the OX has a bigger cover. And that´s where the axle is atashed to the body.

Having blown 2 housings already, first one with A DTT, and second one with DTT and a collar on, the only fix for it is, quit doing obstacles that involve excessive wheel spin and bouncing that gets your tires airborne. Then when a front tire suddenly gets traction, the excessive sudden torque splits the housing and then chews up the gears because the housing is no longer supporting the gear mesh.

I have in the past, done very rough obstacles with wheel spin and bouncing with no ill effects, however, the times I got away with it I beleive it was causing stress cracks in the aluminum that eventually gave out down the road.

Broken front differential housing.

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