Highlander's Bronco Upgrades

[earlybronco72]

They are Yukon Gears less than two years old and maybe 1500 miles.

Ouch, that sucks.

[crawlin68]

Jeez, thanks Pat. I was just having a two year bad luck spell. I'm hoping I can keep this new trend going.
Steve, what brand gears are those, and how long have they been in there?

I was just fun'n with ya bud.

Steve, so what do you think happened first. Broke the R & P which caused the driveline damage? I guess the wheel bearing was just an unrelated breakage? Or did the wheel bearing seize up and mabe helped the R & P breakage?

[Daddy4zack]

Shit good job.. you broke everything.. Damn.. What happened??

Aaron

[highlander]

I was just fun'n with ya bud.

Steve, so what do you think happened first. Broke the R & P which caused the driveline damage? I guess the wheel bearing was just an unrelated breakage? Or did the wheel bearing seize up and maybe helped the R & P breakage?

The wheel bearing wasn't frozen just cracked so that may have happened before and I just didn't notice it, I was starting to notice a slight creak when turning on the road I'll find out if it's still there later. The bearing was all in one piece in the housing and didn't come apart until I pulled it. They were about 13-14 years old with a a lot of miles. I am pretty sure the ring gear went first and bound up taking the driveshaft. The teeth on the pinion gear look fine other than some scarring. It might be time to look into a TrueHi9. My bronco budget is already low with the wedding coming up at the end of the month, and I just payed for the driveshaft, hubs, and a few things I didn't have to finish the cage and seat addition. The slow new housing market isn't helping any either. If I put one on the wedding registry do think any one will buy it

[Familyman]

Nice job on the cage and seats. Very clean. Sorry to hear about the gears.

FM <><

[highlander]

Well slightly good news on the gears, my differential shop is warranting these gears for me, I had to pay a little for some setup parts. But I think I am still going to try and sell it complete so I can upgrade to a TrueHi9.
The pads and Rapz for the roll bar came in so I cut and fit them all and threw them on. If any one is curious I bought the roll bar padding from WH and the roll bar Rapz from Summit. Although the padding from WH is advertised for 2" OD tubing it measure 2 3/8" ID, but it is solid round no slit, so when I cut the slit I cut out about 1.25" and fit perfect. If you use a serrated bread knife the foam will cut very clean and easily. The roll bar Rapz are thin neoprene with velcro sewed down one side and are easily trimmed to length and fit a variety of tube and pad sizes (they stretch and can be overlapped) They aren't as nice as the custom made made zipper covers but very affordable in comparison.
I think I am going to cut all the Rapz tags off, I don't like having advertisements all over the place. Here's a few pictures.

[crawlin68]

Looks good Steve. I used the Rapz on my cage (got it from 4WParts here in Fresno) and I like them too. I need to do the rear section of my cage now that I have a back seat.

[69crawler]

Those wraps really put the finishing touch on your cage. Your bronco looks too nice to wheel now.

[highlander]

Those wraps really put the finishing touch on your cage. Your bronco looks too nice to wheel now.

Thank you!
At the moment it's too broken to wheel

[crawlin68]

What kind of material is your top made of? Look like some sort of screen material. That is a good idea.

[PhantomEB]

??x2 yeah that is a great idea if so. Keeps a little shade going but the breeze flowing!

[highlander]

What kind of material is your top made of? Look like some sort of screen material. That is a good idea.

Yes it is a black sun shade screen, I'm not sure of the product name. I bought a used STC top from Rick (Saddelup) about a year ago, it took him 8 months, several emails, several phone calls, a fraud charge and he finally shipped it to me. This screen safari top was stuffed in the box with it, maybe he felt it would make up for jacking me around, I don't know.
At the time I had no use for it but now that I have the family cage. I thought I would give it a try, I did cut Rick's tag off it though.

[KingOf_Pain]

Thought I would check in and see what I've been missing.

WOW, Steve.

[highlander]

Re: Highlander's Bronco Upgrades

I finally took some time off from work and skiing and spent a afternoon working on the bronco. I started installing my new speedytrack soft top that I got for X-mas. I still need to mount the tailgate channel and add some snaps on the ends of the windshield frame. I threw my Bestop 2-piece doors on for the pictures, but they still need the hinges and latches mounted to the inserts. When I looked at my build thread I realized I didn't post anything about my last few repairs and modifications.
I blew up the Currie HP 9", so I now have new 9+ nodular third with ARB and some new 35 spline axles. The front Detroit grenaded when both front Yukon stubs broke so I now have a ARB front locker and Warn stub shafts. Basically all the carnage from the Swamp lake trip. Since I added the ARBs I needed to add some switches in the cab, so I built a overhead console to hold them. I built it out of sheet medal it drops in between the two upper spreader bars on the cage. I used the switches from ARB for the lockers and compressor. I bought one more momentary switch that matches the ARB switches from a marine supply store that connects to a gate opener located inside the console. That way no one can easily steel my gate opener out of the bronco. Since I was building the console I figured it would be a good time to install a CB radio. Nothing fancy, just a Uniden PC68XL with a slight tune and a Wilson 4' flex antenna.

[Daddy4zack]

Re: Highlander's Bronco Upgrades

Looks awesome Steve!!! The only thing that will make your rig better is a front Dana 60!!! hmmmmmmm.....

WOW!!!

Aaron