RockRangerII refresh

[RockRanger]

About a month ago I picked up a new to me used rear axle for the ranger. It is a disc brake explorer 8.8 with 4.88 gears an ARB locker and a C-Clip eliminator kit installed. Also included was a Ridler diff cover for the 8.8 and a one for a dana 44. I also got an ARB compressor and a YJ rear driveline for a friend for $650. I can't get just the ARB for that price.

So out came the old drum brake explorer axle with welded spider gears and 4.88 gears.

20170522_124156 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr


Next I cut some spring perches and an axle side traction bar mount.

20170523_105257 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170523_111632 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

I started installing the spring perches and traction bar mount.

20170523_113022 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170523_113043 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170523_113032 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170523_192349 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170523_192401 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

Then the 8.8 has a nice lip on the bottom.

20170523_164436 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

I cut plates and smoothed my last one and liked it so I am doing it to this one as well. Here are the plates.

20170523_154308 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

The start of the install.

20170523_165636 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

 

[Grunizzle]

Dude you stole that for$650

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

Lookin good bud ?

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[PlumCrazy]

Smoothing the lip on the 8.8 makes a night and day difference in rocks. That's most of the reason I narrowed a Lightning 8.8 for my rig. It has ribs in the casting that I tapered down to make ramps up to the lip.

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[RockRanger]

I agree on the ramp. Here it is completed.

20170524_092049 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

This is on the old axle I am removing. It has been on there two or three years now. It sure made it easier to slide it over rocks.

20170524_092002 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

 

[RockRanger]

On the leaf spring perches I drilled a taped a hole to hold the explorer hard brake lines. The hole ended up a little high. On the next set if I do them again I have already adjusted the hole 7/16" lower to make the brake lines fit better The axle was missing all the e brake hardware so a run to the junkyard and a few orders to Amazon and I am slowly working on getting the ebrake sorted out.

20170524_113632 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

20170524_115525 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

 

[RockRanger]

Still don't have the ebrake functioning as well as I would like. That didn't stop me from going to Moonlight Madness to play. The view off the tower on Bald Mountain was awesome.

IMG_0817 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

Playing on bumper buster I just about maxed the front suspension. I have the bumpstops, and shocks set just about perfect.

IMG_0851 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

IMG_0852 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

IMG_0835 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

IMG_0837 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

Then a quick video I made of a few of the obstacles we played on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUDrAL3R7EI

 

[Grunizzle]

as usual, looking awesome

 

[RockRanger]

I was replacing a worn out TRE on the front end when I happened to look at the axle side trackbar mount and saw this.

20170703_140024 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

That bracket is about 6 years old with about 10k miles on it. It is the only bought bracket I have used on the truck. So I started designing up a new bracket to replace the failing one.

bracket2 by Matthew Dresselhaus, on Flickr

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

Is that a rough stuff bracket? Your design looks good but that thing will fill up with dirt quick.

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[RockRanger]

Yes it is. I noticed the one they sell now has been redesigned. The bottom has holes in it so any mud can be washed away. It has bigger drain holes then the ruff stuff one did and there was no noticeable mud caked it the old bracket.

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[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

Oh ok.

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[mavereq]

That's fixable

 

[RockRanger]

I fixed it by cutting it off and building a new bracket.

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[mavereq]

That looks stout