JKUR with Dana 44’s and 37’s going to LS V8

I am taking my JK down to Motech in a few weeks to do a LS swap (L94). I am currently on 37’s and I have the factory Dana 44’s. The fronts have the full Artec armor kit but the axles are still stock. I am currently running 5.13 gears so I know I will need to do another gear change (probably back to 4.56). I hate the idea of putting more money into the 44’s but it’s a lot less than going with Ultimte 60’s. Question is, are any of you running 44’s with 37’s and a 6.2 V8? How are the 44’s holding up? I realize it all depends on how hard you wheel. Just wondering if I’m playing with fire keeping my 44’s and not going to 60’s.

here's my opinion. i would be putting in new axles before i would throw in an LS. you are just asking to be stuck on the trail after you've grenaded a myriad of parts.

I’m sure you will be fine if you don’t push it, but personally I would upgrade everything else first. Your going to have all that power and no way to use it confidently.


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I think it actually all depends on what you are using your JK for. If you are rock crawling and using your Jeep like most of the people on this forum then I'd have to agree with what TrainWreck said above. If your only commuting or putting around on the street then I would think your would be fine. But one thing to keep in mind is that you are already questioning things...... So if you stay with 44's it's always going to be wiggling around in the back of your mind that you might have made a mistake not changing axles and you will probably never be confident in your vehicle, so if it was me that would probably bother me so much that more than likely I'd end up changing them down the line anyways so I'd not waste the money on doing a regear.

I would not regear either. Let the LS spinning a little bit. It won't hurt a thing except a little bit of gas mileage. Not enough that a regear would ever save money.

Keep the 5.13s and later they will be worth more to offset the cost of the right axles, presuming that you swap before you break them.

I bought a jeep with a bad engine and am in the process of doing an LS swap right now. It is a sport with a D30 up front on 35's and 4.88 gears and I'm not too worried about it. If you look through their videos, Motech does plenty of swaps onto stock axles. For me, axles are the next step on my build sheet just because that was my end goal all along and that is the next weak point. I was curious about gearing so I made up this spread sheet for the 6L80. If your looking at the 8 speed your numbers are going to be even better, but you are not that far off the mark with 37's and 5.13's.

Bierpower said:

I bought a jeep with a bad engine and am in the process of doing an LS swap right now. It is a sport with a D30 up front on 35's and 4.88 gears and I'm not too worried about it. If you look through their videos, Motech does plenty of swaps onto stock axles. For me, axles are the next step on my build sheet just because that was my end goal all along and that is the next weak point. I was curious about gearing so I made up this spread sheet for the 6L80. If your looking at the 8 speed your numbers are going to be even better, but you are not that far off the mark with 37's and 5.13's.
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Super helpful chart. Thanks for sharing!!