The spacers are to clear the frame. They are 1.25" spacers, equivelent to a -6 offset now with the stock wheels. I was having major frame rub with the tires at full lock. Yes these are the Dynapro MT's, great tire. Size is 285/70R17, 33x11.5's.

 

Nice man, I subscribed... I want to see the end results of this project. I would love to put in an LSD in the rear, but... I have to many other things going on to jump into that on my DD.

 

so what gear do we need? to fit our diff?

 

Have you had any issues with the spacers? I have always heard that wheel spacers are fine, yet so many people advise against them. School me on the spacing-manship.

 

X2

 

I think just about everybody makes gears for our diffs. Yukon, Standard, Sierra gear, Motive, etc. I went with a company called Quality gear, but that is what my parts store carries and the price they gave me was very competetive to ordering it out of the States. You just need to state what your front diff is, which is the Dodge 8.0 IFS front differential and whether you have the 8 1/4 or the 9 1/4 rear end. With that info they should be able to get you whatever gears you want. Your options are 3.92, 4.10 or 4.56. 4.10 would probably be the best allround gear ratio, but I personally went 4.56 because of my plans for my truck. You can call Randy's Ring and Pinion for Standard or Yukon, Westcoastdifferentials for Sierra gears (they were the best price of all the inquiries that I made as well as a quality product) or several people for Motive's. Ask for the ring and pinion and a bearing rebuild kit.

 

There are two kinds of spacers. The kind that I have that are adapter wheel spacers, or the kind that just bolt in behind your wheel (they come in 1/4" or 3/8" increments or something like that) Never get that kind. Your wheel lugnuts loosen off, people sheer their lugs off etc. The kind like I have actually bolt onto your current lugs, then provide new lugs that your wheel bolts onto. There is nothing at all to worry about with these. You just have to retorque them after X number of miles just like retorqueing your wheels. I went with 1.25" spacers, but could have gotten away with 1" and with 1" then your stock wheel is like a 0 offset as 25.4mm = 1".

Pics of my spacers on.

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Ok I'm pretty sure I get it Thanks for explaining, and where did you get yours?

 

O.k. I didn't have a whole lot of time today to work on the differential as I put the soffits up on my shop today, but what I do have I will show you.

This is the complete dissassembly of the differential itself.

Step 1; take off the pinion nut. I used a 1 1/4" socket.

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Step 2; use a puller and pull off the flange

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Step 3; I seem to have missed a picture somehow, but the axle pin in the center of the spyder gear assembly is held in with a roll pin, or shear pin. It only comes out one way, so use a small punch (I used a finishing nail and punch as my punch was not long enough) and punch it out. Now your pin will begin to move.

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Step 4; remove the axle pin. When you do this two of the inner gears (top and bottom) will want to come out. Mark what gear went where and remove them.

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Step 5; now push your axles inward a bit and remove the axle clips that are in there and pull out your axles. Now note what gear and what spacer come out of what location. These spacers determine the amount of backlash that you will end up with.

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Step 6; Take the bolts off of the bearing caps. Then remove the bearing caps, I used a 15mm socket.

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Step 7; Now pull out your ring gear assembly by wiggling back and forth. Keep track of parts.

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Step 8; Remove the Pinion from the housing. Press or tap out the pinion from the nut end into the housing. Before and after.

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Step 9; press off your old pinion bearing for fitment on the new pinion (optional) or wreck it to get it off - you need the shim(s) for the new pinion.

old crush seal
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Old pinion, shims under the bearing
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Step 10; take off the old ring gear - Not what you want to happen, maybe that is why it is recommended to not use the old bolts on the new ring gear

EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT - JUST IN CASE ANYONE ELSE DOES THIS, THE RING GEAR BOLTS ARE REVERSE THREAD. SO DON'T LOOSEN THEM NORMALLY OR YOU WILL BE TIGHTENING THEM AND SNAP!!

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Step 11; Press off the old bearings from the ring gear housing. Not an easy task on mine. One came off o.k., the other one I had to heat the crap out of the bearing.

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Step 12; Remove the old pinion seal, inner bearing now will come out.

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Step 13; Remove the old bearing races from the housing. You need a Long thick punch to do this easily if you don't have the proper puller. I punched mine out.

Inner
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Outer
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Now that is all for now. The only thing I didn't do yet is to remove the outer axle seals as I also have new ones to put in. I will be working on it a bit at nights next week.

 

I got to give it to ya man. I would never be able dive into my differential like that, even though I know what Im doing.