my brother has an 87 or an 89 1/2 ton 4x4. I have an 84 3/4 ton that I am going to donate the axles out of for an upgrade to his truck when he gets the motor done. I have been through a lot with my IFS on my 83, lifts, axle shafts, etc., and I didnt think the swap would be too much of a problem. WRONGO!!! I believe his truck is an 89 and it has the crappiest setup I have ever seen. Whose brilliant idea was it at ford to use Ranger/Bronco II style hubs and related hardware anyway? I figured we could simply swap the carrier, gears and all, and the axle shafts, and the spindle. Well, it sounds good, right? One big problem. The spindle bolt patterns are completely different. That would not be a problem if I could use the housings from my 3/4 ton, but I cant as it is a leaf spring setup and my brothers is a coil spring setup which we would really like to keep. I have asked about this junk setup on the 89 before, and didn't really get much response. When you remove the front wheel, you can just slide the whole hub assembly off in your hands, it's only held on by the wheel and lug nuts!!!!! I personally would trust this setup about as far as I could throw it. Do any of you 4x4 gurus out there have any thoughts? Also, I was going to post this under an existing thread, but my question didn't really seem to relate to his under D44IFS questions, but now that I think about it, am I going to have the same problem that he did? Any info appreciated!!

 

You can get a junkyard D44IFS for less than $300 - probably ~$180. There are 3 in the yard I was in Monday.

But if you want to stay original , I have an '88 with that type of hub that I'd LOOOOOOVE to get rid of...