Mission Control... We Have a Problem

wayoflife

Administrator
Staff member
As some of you may know, Cindy and I have made some substantial changes to our 2020 Jeep JT Gladiator and the biggest of them, are the badass trailing arms by EVO. They literally allow us to do things that we really shouldn't be doing in a production vehicle and it really is amazing. But, being that we've put a lot of hard miles on it before the upgrade and after hammering on it right after the build, I decided that I really needed to take some time and give it a thorough once over. With that said...

The first thing I found that needed some help was this - a blown out center support bearing or carrier bearing.
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As you can see, the bearing has completely torn away from the rubber bushing and that's allowing the shaft to flop all over the place.
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Fortunately, that's an easy enough fix and so I've already removed it and shipped it to JE Reel to have it replaced and have the whole shaft rebuild and rebalanced just for good measure.

Now, the second problem is a bit more concerning. With 22" of vertical travel, the rear end of our Gladiator can now tear across serious whoops, at crazy speeds and without ever bottoming out. However, up front... that's a different story. As well as it has done and still does, there are times where the 12" of vertical travel just can't keep up with the rear and there have been a few... harder than I would prefer hits to it during our testing. And, after going over the front axle with a fine tooth comb, this is what I found.
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Need a closer look?
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Yup, that's a crack you're seeing and right on the webbing of the passenger side differential. It's about 1/2" long and while it's not leaking, it is clearly a point of failure and one that will need to be addressed before it becomes a bigger problem.
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Crazy thing is, this is on a Dana UD60, a very stout axle and one that has held up to everything we've been able to throw at it or at least, up until now. And, this really goes to remind me that way more than playing on the rocks, SPEED can and will break anything and everything.

Anyway, now the question is - what to do with this thing? :rolleyes:
 
Oh man that’s crazy about the housing, amazing how much force that suspension soaks up. Must be you need something stronger, whatever that is. Front DTD only has 12” of vertical travel? Thought it was more, but that is a big difference from the rear I guess. I’ll take broken axle too lol
 
JB weld and call it a day!

Lol, but seriously that's a huge bummer. Most surprised to see that on a Dana 60! Seems like while you've beat the hell out of it you haven't really been doing just that for all that long. Hope you can get it sorted out soon.
 
Oh man that’s crazy about the housing, amazing how much force that suspension soaks up. Must be you need something stronger, whatever that is. Front DTD only has 12” of vertical travel? Thought it was more, but that is a big difference from the rear I guess. I’ll take broken axle too lol
Yeah, I don't know if could even put my finger on when it happened being that none of the hits have felt too bad or at least, out of the ordinary. Also, yes, 12" is what you get out of the DTD and it's what Moby has up front too. Maybe just a hair more. The JL bolt on kit has 14.5". The rear with it's almost double the amount of travel... you never feel it.
 
Yikes. That sucks.
Yeah, total bummer but I'm really glad that we picked up our Jeep and started giving things a harder look. If I hadn't, we would have just gone out and kept hammering on it until the whole thing gave I'm sure. Better that I caught it now and maybe help things along.
 
Yeah, I don't know if could even put my finger on when it happened being that none of the hits have felt too bad or at least, out of the ordinary. Also, yes, 12" is what you get out of the DTD and it's what Moby has up front too. Maybe just a hair more. The JL bolt on kit has 14.5". The rear with it's almost double the amount of travel... you never feel it.
I think I was thinking of bolt in kit
 
Wow. Crazy. Being that it's cast, it's going to just keep spreading. With the way you've used that Jeep, I'd imagine it could happen with any pumpkin with the vibration like that. Hope you get it fixed or rectified.
 
Wow. Crazy. Being that it's cast, it's going to just keep spreading. With the way you've used that Jeep, I'd imagine it could happen with any pumpkin with the vibration like that. Hope you get it fixed or rectified.
That is my fear. The biggest problem isn't even getting a new housing - it's all the custom brackets that would need to be welded on again. I won't lie, finding this crack really took the wind out of my sails. But, better to find it on the rack then out the harder way - out in the middle of nowhere and with a complete failure.
 
Damn that sucks and pretty crazy! Glad you found it now and hopefully can get it fixed. I guess snowy weather make for good repair days. lol
 
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