Running through a stretch of mud does call for mandatory wheelspin, but I don't see a guy breaking in those conditions, not very often anyway.

The majority of breaks I see, be they R&P failures (e.g. stripped teeth) or broken axle shafts, come in the rocks with guys flogging their rig Hillbilly Style (read: hard on the gas, bouncing around with the front end, tires howling and the engine revving).

All of a sudden... BOOM! -or- SNAP! And that's the end of your vacation.

So stupid.

So preventable.

 

Good question. As WOL is always saying keep in mind the weak link principle. There are a few main components to consider. The R&P, the carrier (Spider gears), the inner axle shaft, the U-Joint, and the outer axle shaft, the housing including the tubes and the Cs.

Everyone agrees that the housing needs to be strengthened on a stock D30 and D44 as the tubes and the Cs are thin and weak. But what about the internals of the axle?

This is the general order of weakness in a stock JK listed from weakest to strongest.

U-Joint
Axle Shafts
Carrier / Spider gears
R&P

Your U-Joint should fail way before your R&P and the U-joint is relatively cheap and easy to replace.

If you upgrade weakest links of your D30 then the order of weakness changes. If I upgraded my Axle shafts to ones without a U-Joint and one made from stronger materials the order of weakness would change to something like this.

Carrier / Spider gears
R&P
Axle Shafts
RCV Joint

Now your weak link is your spider gears. In this case a torque overload would break the spider gears in the carrier. Broken spider gears can also cause damage to other internal components.

If I then replaced the carrier / spider gears with a locker then my order of weakness changes to something like this.

R&P
Axle Shafts
RCV Joint
Carrier / Locker

Now your R&P is the weak link and if you break the R&P you are looking at an expensive repair and potentially starting over with a new housing.

Also, your stuck modifying at this point as you can't make the D30 R&P stronger.

A stock D44 has a larger and stronger R&P and that's it's only advantage over a stock D30. If you build a D44 up the R&P is not the weak link like it is in a D30.

The Dynatrac D44 improves over the stock D44 by offering much stronger tubes and Cs and you can also select stronger ball joints. This stronger Dynatrac housing in conjunction with stronger internals makes it the strongest option in D44s.

A D60 adds an even stronger housing, larger and stronger R&P, and larger and stronger axle shafts. There are cases where people have broken D60s on JKs so the advice about how you wheel comes into play no matter how modified your JK is.

How much you need to modify is directly based on how you wheel and what you want kind of trails you want to do.

This is why I say wheel your stock D30 and save your money to eventually replace it. Depending on how you wheel you may get away with the D30 for some time. Many folks on the Forum are carefully wheeling 37s on a stock D30 and have gotten away with it for years. Some folks have not been so lucky and have upgraded to D44s or D60s.

 

I have had good luck so far with 37's on my D30. The only upgrades I have done to it are the EVO mini-skids and C-gussets. I did my own welding, so I only have a little over $100.00 bucks into it.

I am going to run the D-30 until it blows and then buy a PR-44. (Might be my last purchase, cause the wife will kill me.)

 

Gussets and sleeves will suffice for 37's. Wheel it for all it's worth... I doubt you'll find the limits of the D30 short of running your JEEP on the Hammers.

 

unfortunately, when some of us bought our 07's, there were not many products on the market (or so it seemed) so we did what we could at the time by building the 30

if i had bought my jk now and now knowing what products are on the market, i would have def purchased a new axle setup. by the time i have paid for arb lockers, gears, labor, axles, etc... i could have bought a 44, with the packages that some offer to add gears and lockers, that takes away alot of labor coast.

it is what it is and i will run my polished turd (d30) untill she wont turn anymore, then its 60's