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MikeWild
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2007
- Messages
- 312
- City
- Vancouver BC Canada
- Vehicle Year
- 1991 Ranger
- Transmission
- Automatic
Well I mounted my fender flares the other day and came to the realization that the current 8.8 isn't wide enough to make the tires and flares look good... (mounted are 34x10.5 LTB's, I wanted fairly skinny tires for better performance under varrying conditions)
I didn't want to use wheel spacers or rims with greater offset to bring them out more because I don't think that's a wise route to go, more stress and possible breakage on the axles shafts.
I went to the wrecker yesterday with my trusty tape measure and decided that I'm going to throw in an 8.8 out of an aerostar. The exploder diff measured roughly 51 inches from backing plate to backing plate, the aerostar was 54 inches. Mind you the aerostar diff has a bunch of extra do-dads that I'll be cutting off with the plasma torch. I'm also going to be moving the rear shocks and relocating them outside the rear frame rails and welding in some shock towers. I don't like the current configuration where the shock tabs hang under the axle and are a potential point of hang up. I'll takes some pics as I progress along.
Has anybody done a swap of this nature before? I've search several threads but didn't see any.
I didn't want to use wheel spacers or rims with greater offset to bring them out more because I don't think that's a wise route to go, more stress and possible breakage on the axles shafts.
I went to the wrecker yesterday with my trusty tape measure and decided that I'm going to throw in an 8.8 out of an aerostar. The exploder diff measured roughly 51 inches from backing plate to backing plate, the aerostar was 54 inches. Mind you the aerostar diff has a bunch of extra do-dads that I'll be cutting off with the plasma torch. I'm also going to be moving the rear shocks and relocating them outside the rear frame rails and welding in some shock towers. I don't like the current configuration where the shock tabs hang under the axle and are a potential point of hang up. I'll takes some pics as I progress along.
Has anybody done a swap of this nature before? I've search several threads but didn't see any.
I considered going disc's, but again, it means more work than I'm prepared to do right now. I've yet to take it out for a shake down run, so I'm kinda itching to finally enjoy the fruits of my labor!
