Axle thoughts

I don`t post much, but read on here a lot. I live in Minnesota, and most of my wheeling around here is trail riding through the woods with some difficult hills. I would like to head up north to the Iron Mines which is a bit more rocky, and I avoid mud like the plague. I have a 2013 Rubicon JKU on 37" KO2`s, which are more like big 35`s, and I am geared at 4:88. If I were to do any reinforcing of the front 44 should I just do the C gussets, or something more? Maybe I don`t need anything more at all, but I figured I could get expert advice here? I know you guys all run bigger axles out there in the rocks, Thoughts?

You should be good with C's on that set up with the wheeling you'll be doing. And if you bend or break shafts, just upgrade to a good set of chromoly's when needed.


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Not much more you can really do with the axle that the factory provides. Best thing to do is wheel the jeep, have fun, and if the housing bends or breaks, upgrade to something like a ProRock with thick, American steel. Some may say sleeve it, but even with sleeves, it won't prevent a bend. And if I'm not mistaken, JKDream even broke his housing with a truss installed during light wheeling. Gussets are cheap and do prevent the C's from bending, but other than that, throwing extra money at the OEM axle may result in a waste.

WJCO said:

Not much more you can really do with the axle that the factory provides. Best thing to do is wheel the jeep, have fun, and if the housing bends or breaks, upgrade to something like a ProRock with thick, American steel. Some may say sleeve it, but even with sleeves, it won't prevent a bend. And if I'm not mistaken, JKDream even broke his housing with a truss installed during light wheeling. Gussets are cheap and do prevent the C's from bending, but other than that, throwing extra money at the OEM axle may result in a waste.

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True story. I romp on my JK pretty good with a lot of skinny pedal but honestly no amount of bracing will stop the housing from breaking if you're playing hard enough.
It's just too wimpy, and really not meant for abuse with a large tire. Wheel it until it breaks, and upgrade to something better - that is if you even break it.
In my case the tube ended up separating from the differential over time with a truss, gussets on 37's.

JKDream said:

True story. I romp on my JK pretty good with a lot of skinny pedal but honestly no amount of bracing will stop the housing from breaking if you're playing hard enough.
It's just too wimpy, and really not meant for abuse with a large tire. Wheel it until it breaks, and upgrade to something better - that is if you even break it.
In my case the tube ended up separating from the differential over time with a truss, gussets on 37's.

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Lol. OK. So I was wrong on the 'light wheeling' part. I was still pretty sure that your housing broke when with a truss.

I would just spend a bit of money on the gussets. Anything else is a waste on the factory axles, even the Rubi 44. Recently my Rubi44 has developed cracks around the plug welds. It has less than 30k miles on it. It has been wheeled in some pretty decent rocks on 35 inch tires. My ball joints creak like crazy now on the trail, and when I jack up a wheel I get a loud clunk sound. So, gusset it, and walk away. Anything else done to it is like farting in the wind.


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