[Bazuka]

Hi guys, just a few questions...

Transfer
Is it OK to tilt the transfer case over a little when lifting it? I was thinking of only lifting the long arm mounts and leaving the upper mount stock. It looks good on the chassis and maybe a little less cutting/body work?

The case I am working with is a NT case with the drum brake, I want to remove the drum and change to WT diffs with a hand brake on the wheels at some stage so the transfer lift will be done with this in mind. How much of a lift will it need to clear the case to 10mm or so above the chassis rails with no drum brake? At the moment 70mm of lift on the long arm does not clear the drum but I guess it would clear the case without drum easy.

What parts do I need to remove the drum brake? Will I need a new flange? A spacer for the drive shaft?

RUF
Will I need longer shock mounts or will the standard mounts be good for RUF, standard shackles, OME springs and WT diffs?

WT diff
If I want to put NT flanges on the diffs so I can use my drive shafts, is there anything I should be looking for when buying WT diffs or are they all the same when swapping flanges?

Cheers for your help
Hamish

[Fatzook]

Transfer:

Tilting the case that much shouldn't effect internal oiling. Only thing to be careful of is the shifter hitting the trans tunnel, so you may need to re-bend the stick....

RUF:

To make the most of it, you will want longer shocks. This means using a taller shock tower, or lowering the bottom shock mount. Tower is the prefered method.

WT Diffs:

Flanges are completely interchangable.

[Bazuka]

Fatzook wrote:

RUF:
Tower is the prefered method.

Is there a tower you could recommend? Something off another 4x4? I want it to look pretty stock so do not want a big loop or solid square tower.

Cheers.

[tanshi]

hilux

[Bazuka]

tanshi wrote:

hilux

Than you

[DMAC]

Fatzook wrote:

WT Diffs:

Flanges are completely interchangable.

Not so I've had WT flanges not fit onto NT diffs. Problem solved by splitting WT and NT prop shafts.

I was under the impression that they were interchangeable too.

[Fatzook]

DMAC wrote:

Fatzook wrote:

WT Diffs:

Flanges are completely interchangable.

Not so I've had WT flanges not fit onto NT diffs. Problem solved by splitting WT and NT prop shafts.

I was under the impression that they were interchangeable too.

Sure they weren't 1L diffs?

[Gwagensteve]

As far as I am aware, WT and NT pinion splines are the same, so the flanges can be swapped.

However, I wouldn't bother, I'd just put the NT third members into the WT housings. NT's have (slightly) lower diff ratios - 3.9:1 and if your diffs are in good condition then there's no reason to swap to the WT diffs.

Swapping diff flanges really requires special tools and skills, along with replacement crush sleeves. Lots of diff gears have ben destroyed by people (including workshops) who thought it wasn't important to follow the (complex) factory procedure for setting pinion preload. I would avoid this whenever possible.

If the WT diffs were geared or have lockers in them, I'd make hybrid driveshafts - no big deal - the same Unis are used with both flanges so its no pain, or swap the transfer case flanges to WT. This can be done without issues with preload - they are torque to spec and that's it.

I wouldn't ditch the transfer mounted drum. it works well and is, in my opinion, superior to the wheel mounted handbrake for a number of reasons. This would leave you with a hybrid rear shaft because there's no WT rear handbrake drum, but as I stated, a hybrid tailshaft is no problem.

Tilting the transfer should be no problem, certainly not from oiling. might be a bit tough on the rubber mounts though as they will be getting ginked, and this might preclude using 1.0 litre style through mounts if you have problems with factory rubber.

Yes, you will need longer shock mounts to make RUF worthwhile. F250 mounts or hilux will work if you want a factory mount.

Steve.

[Bazuka]

Gwagensteve wrote:

However, I wouldn't bother, I'd just put the NT third members into the WT housings. NT's have (slightly) lower diff ratios - 3.9:1 and if your diffs are in good condition then there's no reason to swap to the WT diffs.

I want to have the slightly higher 3.7:1 diffs because when I ship it back to New Zealand in a couple of years I am putting a diesel engine I own over there into it. Diesel is a lot cheaper to run in NZ. The 3.7:1 are good for gearing the diesel. I will be getting lockers later and don't want to have to swap the lockers around if I don't have to.

Gwagensteve wrote:

Swapping diff flanges really requires special tools and skills, along with replacement crush sleeves. Lots of diff gears have ben destroyed by people (including workshops) who thought it wasn't important to follow the (complex) factory procedure for setting pinion preload. I would avoid this whenever possible.

Yeah not keen to re-setup the diffs. Maybe an option when I fit lockers.

Gwagensteve wrote:

If the WT diffs were geared or have lockers in them, I'd make hybrid driveshafts - no big deal - the same Unis are used with both flanges so its no pain, or swap the transfer case flanges to WT. This can be done without issues with preload - they are torque to spec and that's it.

A question on hybrid shafts... Do you just change the last segment at the U joint or is it one half of the shaft that needs swapping out? Just wanting to know if I would have to find a LWB WT shaft or if any WT shaft can be used to make my NT shaft a hybrid shaft.

Gwagensteve wrote:

I wouldn't ditch the transfer mounted drum. it works well and is, in my opinion, superior to the wheel mounted handbrake for a number of reasons. This would leave you with a hybrid rear shaft because there's no WT rear handbrake drum, but as I stated, a hybrid tailshaft is no problem.

What are the reasons? I was thinking of getting the rear disk and hand brake kit, I thought this would be better than a drum on the transfer and the drum would not be hang down below the bottom of the chassis then. But I am always open to ideas and can tilt the transfer over more to clear the chassis if there are real benefits to the drum hand brake.

Gwagensteve wrote:

Tilting the transfer should be no problem, certainly not from oiling. might be a bit tough on the rubber mounts though as they will be getting ginked, and this might preclude using 1.0 litre style through mounts if you have problems with factory rubber.

I have some poly mounts coming and will mod them to fit the angle change.

Gwagensteve wrote:

Yes, you will need longer shock mounts to make RUF worthwhile. F250 mounts or hilux will work if you want a factory mount.

Great, I will try and find a pair now.

Cheers for the answers guys, really helping me figure this all out.

[Gwagensteve]

No, just swap the yokes over on the shafts. It's all interchangeable 1.3 WT to NT

In relation to drum handbrake - they are easy to adjust, up out of more of the rubbish than the wheels, and you already own it. To run the wheel handbrake, you'll be up for a WT handbrake cable, which are REALLY dear if you don't get one with the axles. I also believe the bracket that retains the cable on the body needs to be moved to fit the WT cable - I've had to do this in the past. I also don't like rear drums and don't like wheel mounted cable handbrakes on discs if I can avoid it, for the same reasons I don't like them with drums.

I don't like anything on my axles I don't need - more to get caught up on stuff is worse than less.

I'm not 100% on the commercially available disc handbrakes. I've played with a spidertrax brake and think it's both poor value for money and a PITA that it's not self adjusting. I haven't had it on a functional car though, so the jury is still out for me.

Steve.

[Fatzook]

Gwagensteve wrote:

I've played with a spidertrax brake and think it's both poor value for money and a PITA that it's not self adjusting. I haven't had it on a functional car though, so the jury is still out for me.

Steve.

The disc is far more suseptable to damage than the bulky transfer brake. The only vehicle I've been in with the spidertrax E-brake kit did 10 mins of wheeling before the disc was bent on a rock. This prevented any forward or backward motion, and it had to be removed to limp the zook home.

Pass.

[Bazuka]

That's good to know as I had thought about getting the disk transfer hand brake, I thought is might be a little smaller than the drum and clear the chassis easier but sounds no good.

Well It sounds like the drum is good at what it does so maybe I lift the transfer a little higher and keep it...

I have one question regarding this... I can clear the chassis if I lift the rear of the long arm 70-80mm and the front 40mm. This changes the angle of the drive shafts as they leave the box. In stock location the front shaft has quite a large angle compared to the rear shaft, the box seems to sit tilted back. If I lift the box how I suggested, it seems to be quite straight with similar angles front and back...

Will I have any issues with this or does it sound A OK?

[Teracis]

I've used 3 pieces of 50x50x3mm shs before successfully as a transfer lift, just on stock mounts and rubbers, all I did was drilled the shs and got 3 bolts and bolted it in. Iirc I put the shs on the bottom or chassis mount side and left the rubbers on the transfer case.
It sounds like you are looking to lift the mounts on the chassis though however I could suggest lifting the one side and spacing the other, rather than just lifting one side. It would keep the transfer in its original plane and reduce work to the shifter as well as not having to lift the one side so high.

I was running 6.5 reduction gears btw but I don't drive with a heavy foot, I had a pretty tired motor but never tore a mount.