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| Installing a Currie-built Ford 9" High Pinion | Short Cuts | ||||
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By: Chris Bassett - 6/2000
Grand Cherokee Currie High Pinion rear-end, or Building a ZJ Ford Tough!
The job basically boils down to:
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| Removing the weak D35c
photo by: Chris Bassett |
-Block the front tires.
- Unbolt the drive-shaft from the pinion. Have two rags handy; one to wrap
around/protect the transfer case yoke, and one to stuff into the transfer case output,
to prevent contamination and/or leaking.
- Jack up rear-end, place the vehicle on jack stands, and remove tires.
- Leave the jack under the differential.
- Remove the shock absorbers.
- Unbolt trac-bar at the housing.
- Unbolt brake calipers and hang them in the wheel wells with bungee cords.
- Unbolt the e-brake cables from the upper control arms. Currie sent me the wrong e-brake cable kit, so I had to carefully unseat
my original cables from the Dana 35's backing plate. Otherwise this task would've been as easy as disconnecting the e-brake cables from the upper
e-brake cable.
- Disconnect brake lines from the Dana 35 housing. this is accomplished by unscrewing the breather tube from the housing.
- Unbolt the control arms at the housing, lower the floor jack until housing is at full droop, then remove the coils.
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| D35 removed. Ready for new unit.
photo by: Chris Bassett |
The housing is now ready to be rolled out of the way. The Currie High Pinion rearend holds three quarts of gear oil. I seized the opportunity to make this messy task a snap by rotating it on the pallet, poring the oil in. Now comes the fun part. This being a one man operation, I was forced to use two floor jacks to position the Currie housing. A differential housing being round, this was no easy task. Patience at this point is a virtue. Patience paid off and I completed the installation not two hours later. Installation is performed following the above steps in reverse.
All that remained was disassembling the Dana 35 housing. My Dana 35 contains perfectly good spare axle shafts, Detroit No-Spin Locker, 4.56 R&P gears, and disc brake backing plates. Currie requires the Dana 35 axle brackets and spring perches as core. Wanting to cut down on the shipping costs for the core, I hacked up the housing with a steel cut-off saw. Forgot to take a pic of the carnage, man what a sight!
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| Lifting the new axle into place.
photo by: Chris Bassett |
Currie recommends 600 break-in miles before any hardcore wheeling. A couple
trips to the Sierra's, a couple to Santa Cruz, and I was ready to put my investment to the test. The first trip
off-road provided some great twisty terrain that stuffed my 33" Super Swamper SSR's snugly against the Tomken
bumper and inner wheel well lip. This same situation cost me a snapped Dana 35c axle shaft, under light throttle. I
powered through the spot, the tires clunked and complained the whole way, the Currie
rear-end said bring it
on! Further up the trail we came across one hell of a hill climb. After watching a fellow Jeep club member buck and bounce his XJ up the
hill, I said time to play and put the pedal down! The Currie performed as expected, flawlessly. Not
20 minutes later a 33" BFG MT outfitted, Dana 35c rear-end equipped TJ attempted the same hill climb. Less than half way up, our group heard the
distinctive, and disheartening sound, of a Dana 35c axle shaft giving up the ghost. This cut our day of wheeling short, as we spend the majority of the
afternoon helping the poor sap off the hill and out of the park.
I've since off-roaded the ZJ a couple other times, all without issue. I'm extremely satisfied with my investment. The Currie rear-end is built tough, and built to last.
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| Currie 9" installed.
photo by: Chris Bassett |
The only setbacks this project had are as follows:
- This was Currie's first ZJ build-up. As a result, they kept trying to adjust the price. Bless Michael for sticking to his guns, I paid what I was
quoted.
- The axle whines while maintaining highway speed. Currie is helping me debug this issue, they're thinking its due to pinion angle. I'm not so
sure, but am willing to give it a shot. So far my adjustments haven't lessened the whine. I'm
going to take the ZJ over to Rear-end Specialties in Santa Clara and have them test
drive it. I'm wondering if the whine could be a result of incorrect lash on the R&P gears.
- The housing was not powder-coated. It was pretreated, (Steelabrated), for
powder-coating, however. This housing comes completely assembled. Disassembly for
powder-coating is out of the question. I'll likely sand the housing clean, then take a paint can to it. Not much Currie can do to make this right. My
recommendation to potential Currie customers is, to make sure they verify
powder-coating before shipping.
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| Author flexing his ZJ
photo by: Julie Souza |
- The output yoke was of the Ford flange variety, not the standard u-joint
cup. I had to drive down to South Bay Driveline in San Jose, in front wheel
drive, to have my driveline outfitted with a Ford companion flange.With a NP231
transfer case, can you say 'wide turns'? Steve Johnson, owner of South Bay Driveline, is a
drive shaft wizard and promised me my shaft back by the end of the day. I told him to take his time,
as I'd pick it up the following morning. I ate the cost of this unexpected fabrication.
- I had originally ordered Currie's Triangulated Control Arm setup for the housing. A benefit of this setup is no trac-bar. Currie also said my Tera
adjustable arms would work for this application. Just before
they commenced build-up, Currie told me I'd have to run custom control arms at additional cost of several hundred dollars. I passed on this idea and
stuck with the standard control arm configuration. This meant I'd have to run a trac-bar
after all. Michael promised to make this, and the unexpected drive shaft cost, right, by offering me a new RE adjustable rear trac-bar. As
of today, I'm still waiting to receive the trac-bar. Apparently RE's completion date keeps slipping.
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