I'm running a bone stock '68 FJ40, with a 2.5 lift. A friend of mine is leaving the state and is ditching his '76 chevy 1 ton with me, it has a new crate 350, muncie 4speed with granny low mated to a 205 transfer. Im wondering what, if any of the running gear would be nice to have on a cruiser; and if anyone has put a muncie + 205 into an fj40. Is it worth the swap to the new setup, or just run the 350 with the stock 3speed and vacum transfer?
By the way, the truck has massive body damage, not worth my time to repair, i like my cruiser better anyways.

Yup, plenty of people have put that combo into a Cruiser. You will need a centered diff rear axle though - I dont think there is enough driveshaft length to do a cross wise D/L to the stock axle. I have heard of people flipping the Cruiser rear axle 180* - think of it as looking down from the top and spinning the axle 180*, effectively, the diff becomes offset to the driver side instead of the passender side - this moves the pinion closer to the center of the axle (if you look at your third member you will notice the pinion is not centered in the third member but off to the outside). You may have to notch the housing to get ring gear clearance. Basically, your third member now bolts in where the diff cover used to be and vice versa. There will be a slight sideways angle on your driveshaft, but as the rig is not excessively lifted it should not matter. HTH

Damn skippy! I would keep the 205 and find a centered axle or do what Krusty says!

Nice find...

Why not just use the centered rear axle from the parts rig???
Free is good!!!

Although so is ground clearance :D

Originally posted by Jason M
Why not just use the centered rear axle from the parts rig???
Free is good!!!

Although so is ground clearance :D

Yeah, thats an option - but then you have 8 lug on the rear and 6 lug down front - two spares - nah! Also, a whopping 69" wide axle! Clearance - shave the 14 bolt!

Sell the cruiser rear axle, convert the chevy to six lug and narrow it.
If you did it right you could break even. Besides, do you have any idea how cheap detroits are for a 14 bolt???

Piece of cake..

:)

Originally posted by Jason M
Sell the cruiser rear axle, convert the chevy to six lug and narrow it.
If you did it right you could break even. Besides, do you have any idea how cheap detroits are for a 14 bolt???

Piece of cake..

:) And spools are even cheaper:cool:

If you flipped the rear axle 180*, the the rear tires would be going backwards while the front tires are going forwards. Unless the t-case spins the opposite way, but that couldn't be. :confused:

I think what Krusty was talking about was flipping the housing 180* and then running the carrier in the normal orientation. Nit a bad idea actually.. I never thought of doing it that way..
Makes me think about running a stronger tcase now...

God, another thing to think about for axles and tcases..:rolleyes:

Originally posted by Jason M
I think what Krusty was talking about was flipping the housing 180* and then running the carrier in the normal orientation.

You got it - I was not clear enough - kinda Krusty this morning:emb4:

When someone explained it to me it took a moment or two to sink in :idea:

Am I missing something here??? why screw with swapping this keeping that, converting this blah, blah, blah
It's a 4wd 1 ton- use everything: motor, tranny, t-case, axles etc... That is the most sought after conversion going these days (read:trendy) although stout. Am I way off base here or what?:smokin:

I'm with you aggro - do the full deal and have what most of us would give our left *** for. If you don't want it I'll take it off your hands:flipoff2:

Originally i was thinking of shortening the axles to a more trail worthy length, but up here there arent many shops that do this making it relativley expensive. What are you guys paying for this?
Another bonus that comes with this rig is a set of near new 33*16.5 tires, how much am i going to need to offset the rims as to not rub the grease zirk on the passenger side tie rod end?

If anyone has done this setup, v8 to 465 to 205, what is your wheelbase?

Okay, run it fullwidth. Get some bigger tires, spring it over and go from there!!!

I bet you could fit at least 38's under it...

:D


Now you are talking about a bunch of other mods. It is not worth it to do a full width swap on a SU cruiser...

71RCKCRZR on this board is running this set-up in a SOA rig - flipped the rear springs, as I recall. Prolly has 100" wheelbase. Not that I have anything against the full width axle swaps, but man you are opening another whole can of worms. BTW 16.5" rims are useles for a wheeling rig - the bead design allows the tire to roll right off the rim when aired down - most folks use 15" 8 lug rims or go to beadlocks. Plus, tire sizes and styles are more limited for 16.5" rims.

Originally posted by Jason M
Now you are talking about a bunch of other mods. It is not worth it to do a full width swap on a SU cruiser...
And a new project is born... He won't be wheeling that Cruiser for another year and a half now! :D

Thanks alot for the advice everyone, i think i will be turning my axle 180* and keeping it sua for now and save the 14 bolt for future mod(hopefully near future). All shops that i talked to in the state recomended i have my axles shortened somewhere else to save some dough. However, if anyone in alaska knows of a place that will do it, please tell me. Thanks again.

I think you've got the right drivetrain for your neck of the woods.
I have the same combo, but with an FJ25 centered housing.

Works for me right now.

Where's Charlie Aarons on this one??????:beer:

just curious, anyone know the wheelbase of a standard cab short bed chevy?

The 2000 Chevy Silverado Z71, regular cab, short bed has a wheelbase of 119 inches. I hope that helps.:smokin: