The Goal .. take apart my Dana 44 housing and install a Detroit Locker along with new bearings and seals.  Sounds easy enough, right?

When building my last jeep, I did not have to rebuild either of the axle housings.  In the rear I had a Dana 44 from a mail jeep.  Mail jeeps come with detroit lockers:  note that the housing is a little narrower than a standard jeep by approx 2".  To fix this, you can have some shims machined that will allow you to use standard flanged jeep axles.  

Fast forward to the new jeep.  I had a Dana 44 I knew nothing about and a detroit locker I wanted to install inside it.  I figured this would be a good opportunity to learn about ring and pinions; and, learn a thing or two I did!

The First Issue – Broken teeth

Naturally, the first step was to pull off the housing cover and examine the condition of the gears.  Unfortunately, the news was not good.  I quickly discovered that I had a very broken tooth on the ring gear.

Interestingly, there was no evidence of broken pieces in the oil.  This lead me to suspect that the previous owner may have discovered the damage while changing the gear oil and 'forgotten' to mention it to me.  Also, once I pulled everything apart, I would also find the pinion gear broken as well.  

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At left is a pretty stock CJ-5 frame.  There were some cracks where the front crossmember attached to the passenger side frame rail.  Because of this, I felt the crossmember had to go so I could box in the front of the frame.

At the back of the frame, the driver’s side was slightly lower than the passenger side.  Also, because I wanted to outboard the back springs, I needed to add a bracket onto the side of the frame to help support both the front and the back of the springs.

To make all these changes meant a great deal of work .. welding, grinding (and welding and grinding again) and painting.  I am pleased with the results.

Click here to see many more pics of the frame transformation.

I purchased this jeep CJ-3A body and parts for $450.  It came without running gear, but with a recently rebuilt engine and transmission.   I just happened to have a rolling frame without a body, so I put all the parts I didn’t want on the rolling frame and sold that.  I ended up making all my money back from this purchase and was left with the fenders, hood, windshield and the data plate that goes on the dashboard 🙂

I decided to purchase a CJ-5 to get a better frame and running gear.  Here's some pics of it.  It's a 1973 CJ-5 with a Chev 350, a sm420 tranny, center rear differential with the dana 20.  I ended up parting out most of it.