78 D44 matched with 76 D44

breefee_BII · Post by **breefee_BII** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 10:55 am

ok guys I picked up a D44 out of a 78 fs bronco but I bought the cage 5.5 progressive rate spring for the front. My problem is what to do, to correct my pinion angle with cast wedges. I pulled radius arms out of a junk yard and the axle is still there so i'm wondering should I stick with what i've got now or can I go back and swap my disc setup off of the 78 and switch it to the 76 axle in the junk yard.

If I can make my 78 work I would rather do that. ground clearance is critical for this rig "rock crawler only".
_________________

Post by **Nobody** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 7:49 pm

I think 7* bushings are most you can use to correct your pinion angle. To get more you have use radius arm drop brackets which sucks.

Personally, I'd lean toward the dana 44 with the welded on wedges and set it how you want it. The knuckes and brakes will swap over to the 76. However if you are building a rockcrawler, I'd keep the drum knuckles on the 76 and do the chevy disc conversion. The steering arm is quite a bit higher on the drum knuckles.

DBrown · Post by **DBrown** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 9:17 am

you are going for full width right?

if this is true I would stick with the 78 housing for a few reasons...bigger axle joints...unless the 76 has up graded, the disk brakes are already in tact, and high pinion.

now, that being said I would see if you can score the knuckles off the other housing because of what Nobody has mentioned...higher steering.

as far as the pinion angle, I would worry about caster before I would worry about pinion angle. if you move the wedges you are going to have bad caster. so you would then be cutting and turning the axle ends also. also the high pinion housing will help with the pinion angle.

breefee_BII · Post by **breefee_BII** » Fri Oct 13, 2006 8:10 pm

ok so what are you guys running to correct your steering. I've decided after your wisdom to stick with the high pinion my question is will I have to extend my radius arms or just wrist one. I did see on the bfix website that a guy wristed at the top but still not sure how well it will work my goal is flex so I am leaning toward the cage arms even at the tune of 800. any ideas on the best way to max my travel.

DBrown · Post by **DBrown** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 2:21 pm

honestly one wristed arm and one stock arm works fine. the extended arms are ok but you will probably break them if you come down on them wrong. just make sure you get the right coils to go with them.

breefee_BII · Post by **breefee_BII** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 10:05 pm

I'm looking at cage 5.5 for fs bronco the guy at cage said it would probably be about 6 inches of lift.