Generic expo HPD30 8.8 build.

[albersondh]

Shake down went fairly well. Just checking general drivability type stuff at the moment. The Esploder rear sway works like a charm, it quick steers at speed as well as I could have hoped for with minimal roll, it tracks straight, and with the 35's it actually feels a lot more stable then it did with the 30's, Im sure the added width is contributing to that. Sitting at about 5" rear and about 4.75" front. Did some high speed bumpy stuff and nothing flew off so thats good. The rear shocks are perfect with the angle back I have them set at, I actually wouldnt care to have them any straighter, just enough dampening for me. The rear end feels very solid, no kicking out at all, the double triangulated links are doing there job. Deffinatly can feel the power loss with the 4.10's but certianly nothing I cant live with.

Im getting a bit of a constant grind/ish howl coming from the rear, its speed dependant and no change during accel, decel, cruise, or cornering. Doesnt sound like pinion bearing at all (higher pitch) so either carrier or axle bearing I suspect. Like a lazy bastard I didnt rebuild any part of the axle other than installing the Aussie, and of course this is how it goes.... Jacked it up and ran it with the rears off the ground and couldnt really nail down the noise, checked for heat differential with the IR gun and nothing is popping out as much hotter then the other side. Made sure the brakes were not dragging especialy the e-brake shoes. So I did the axle bearings tonight, the old ones looked fine. The carrier feels solid and no obvious janky spots when I was rotating the mess to get the locker out. At this point I gotta believe its either the carrier bearing/s or my new CV shaft is much noiser than Im used to. This is the first thing I have been in with a double cardin main DS so I really have no clue if that should even matter.....

[Jeeptech01]

Did the same thing, polished up the outside of the 8.8 only to put it in and find it needed a rebuild. Mine was the carriers FWIW pretty much the same as you are describing. Funny thing is I just figured out the lr axle shaft is bent the other day too. It never ends..

Glad to hear the rig is performing well and there arent many bugs to work out. That has got to feel good.

[albersondh]

Yea bad carrier bearing, rebuilt it, all is well. Got a bit over 1000 highway miles on it now and I cant complain. Range is right around 300 miles which sucks but mehh cant have it all. Did a front bumper and 9k winch with Amsteel, also got some decent springs up front, IRO 4.5's. Current lift is right at 5.25", with the up country front sway, esploder rear, 2" spacers on the 8.8 and 1.25" spacers on the HPD30, 315/70/17's; its wide enough, low enough and has enough sway bar to keep it nice and flat on turns. Im working on a on-board hot water system right now should be done in the next week or two, just gotta work out the plumbing.

Poser shots.






I want to push the front axle forward 1-2" but the spring bow is just too much. The springs hit the sway bar links (JKS disco's). Cant move the bar forward enough without running the bar into the lower radiator hose. After thinking it over for a while I decided Ill never go over 35's so Im seriously thinking of trussing the 30 and moving the perches back 2".

[rstrucks]

Nice and clean, looks really good.

[Jeeptech01]

Nice work man. I really like the look.

[albersondh]

So I got some nice WK seats:





Went to work on getting the electrical working. It turned out pretty straight forward to get all the mechanical functions working, just one hot and a ground. I was going to mess with getting the heaters working as well, but they dont fit.... WK seat tracks are 21" wide compared to the very narrow and extramely off-set ZJ tracks. I built some 1.625 raised brackets to try and get around the tunnel hump, no dice, seats end up too high and still not enough off-set towards the tunnel to get the seat centered very well.... It could be done but I would need to cut up the tunnel and then clearance between the fabbed tunnel section and x-fer case at the 10-11 o'clock position would be very close. Sucks, Im in love with these seats.... Oh well, they will go in my CUCV eventualy.

[CTeunuch]

Your build is great, well thought out and executed, and it looks super clean. Where did you get the 2" spacer/adapters for the rear? Any rubbing with the JK Moabs and the 8.8 now that you're running them?

[PurpleZJ]

why do you want to move the axle forward? great build though, outside of the cost of the hp30 itself how much did the wj upgrade cost?

[Mad-Line]

that's really nice build,

[albersondh]

Your build is great, well thought out and executed, and it looks super clean. Where did you get the 2" spacer/adapters for the rear? Any rubbing with the JK Moabs and the 8.8 now that you're running them?

Thanks. The spacers for the rear were custom, got them from another member on here. The 2" spacers are perfect with the spidertrax up front, no rubbing in the rear ever, and the turn radius is not bad at all.

why do you want to move the axle forward? great build though, outside of the cost of the hp30 itself how much did the wj upgrade cost?

I cant remember the cost of everything but if you can find an alternative for the WJ BJ's do it. They cost a lot. The sway bar JKS disco's where they mount to the axle were rubbing and moving the axle forward would fix that. I spent a lot of time just adjusting the axle position (IRO iorn Y) on the joints turn by turn untill I got everything to clear so its not an issue any longer. I have thought about pulling the 30 and doing a truss but at this point Im just waiting for a JK 44 to come up for sale.

[TN_WJ]

Where did you get the 2" spacer/adapters for the rear?

I had this guy make the ones for my 8.8, only person I could find that would make them 2''.
http://www.wheeladapter.com/