ok if you know my whole front end conversion ordeal/nightmare then you will have an idea of what i am doing.

i found a ford 77 high-boy for $750 in fair shape. now i dont think a dana44 would stand up to the 1000lbs diesel motor or not (your thoughts???) but for some reason i thought that the high boy's might have had a heavy duty 44 but not sure on that (your thoughts??).

what i need is a dana 60 but i cant afford to pay $1500 for one so if the high boy's did have a HD axles, do you think they would stand up to the extra weight of the diesel i want to cram in the 94'???

 

The HD D44 would probably stand up to that, but you've picked a lousy vehicle to steal the axles from. Get ready for a lot of fabrication - the spring perches are in a different location on that truck, and so are the shock mounts.

 

why do you say that i chose a lousy truck? so far its the only thing that i have fond that even comes close to working that i can afford. yes i would definitly LOVE to have a dana 60 but i cant find one under $1200. yeah i know thats usually what they go for but still that just seems like a lot to me. i mean if i went to an autoauction for several weeks i could run across a whole truck w/ a d60 on the dead row for $1200-$1500. but i dont have the time being that i am at college. i am going to call more junkyards in my area tomorrow and see if i can get lucky for once. i almost found a d60 cheap today but it was the wrong dana...the guy seemed to think that it was a dana 60, the sad part is he is a auto salvage man and the axle was from a 1/2 ton w/ IFS!

man, this project is going crazy on me. i've done a few crazy builds but this one seemed fairly easy at first...diff motor and a diff front end, thats it. and it still is easy but turns out to be expensive and time consuming. i guess that what i get for building another one-off huh?

 

Like I said, the spring perches and shock mounts aren't going to line up. You're going to have to move them to get them to line up. That's why Ivan advised you to go with a 78-79 or 86-97 truck.

 

i see what you mean but making all that stuff line up isnt a problem. thats what i do...custom suspension work. i just have never done a 4x4 before. but we'll see. i hope to find a dana 60 at a good price or else i will have to buy the high-boy. but yes, i would like to just be able to bolt up a dana 60. let me ask you something. if i got a dana 60 from a dually that was 4x4, can i take of the wheel extender for the front dually wheel to put on the regular 3/4 ton wheels?

 

It's not a big deal to use an early axle in a later truck because you can weld on a new spring perch on the driver's side and move the one on the passenger's side. The trouble comes when you want to put a later axle into an early truck because the driver's side perch is cast into the pumpkin so you can't go any narrower, you have to widen the frame/spring hangers. Buy a set of spring perches ($20 or so) and you'll be good to go. The driver's side perch will be on the tube itself rather than the pumpkin, there's nothing wrong with that. Btw, this is the same thing you'd need to do if you found a 78/79 D60.

Are you certain it's a highboy and not a late 77 with the married T-case? If it is a highboy it will have the divorced t-case. This will work for you but remember that you'll need to use a 2wd tranny or at least find a 2wd tailshaft housing to mount on your tranny. The divorced case uses the driveline between tranny and t-case. If you get a truck with a married case it should pretty much bolt up to that tranny.

That's not a bad price on the parts truck really, IF you can make good use of the t-case. If not then you're paying $750 for the front axle and a D44 front isn't worth that, even an HD. Are you under a deadline to get this done?

 

ummm...you have me a bit confused about the 2wd tranny. i am not sure the truck is a high-boy cause when i went to look at it a few weeks ago no one was home so i didnt want to crawl all over someone's truck ya know? but i called the owner yesterday and talked to him for a while. he swears the truck is a 77 high-boy and that it ran when he parked it a year ago. he says that everything worked and that they put in a new radiator right before they parked it. says they parked it because they bought a newer truck to use as a farm truck rather than the 77. but from what i remember the body really wasnt bad at all. i asked the guy and he said he thought the floor pans were ok (if not i have a set of replacements in the garage) and he says the cab mounts arent rusted and that the cab corners are just starting to rust, and the rear wheel wells are just starting, but he says the doors are bad. i think i might have a set of good doors.

if i cant use the axle i thought about buying the truck to restore...is a regular 3/4 ton better or more sought after than a high-boy. i think what i mean is is it hard to buy parts for the high-boy? are they too odd?

but i was just wondering if the axle would be heavy enough for a 800-1000lb motor and the factory ZF tranny?

about the 2wd tranny...i dont understand why i need a 2wd tranny i was just going to end up using the ZF (the truck i want to put the axle under is 94 f250 4x4) but if i did swap it out it would have to be for a 4speed i would guess. i only wanted a 5peed b/c of overdrive (the truck will be a daily driven highway driver, not much off road at all)

 

well i know the front axle isnt worth $750, but i figured if worse came to worse, i might be able to part out the rest of the truck and get my money back and have a free front axle. so far i cant find an older D60, and i only found a few of the newer ones in my area and they want 1200-1500 for one of those. i have been callin around and askin for a Dana 60 from a mid 90's f350 4x4. is there any other models this front axle was put in? and for the older ones, were there only the two years you mentioned above?

oh, and yes there is a dead line, i have till the end of feb to get it done. i have everthing i need except a front axle and a conversion plate to mount the diesel to the ford ZF tranny. i was told that back in the day ford made a light utility semi and that they had the perkins 354 diesel that i am tring to use. now they had the bellhousing that will allow me to bolt up a 4speed (from what i was told they used the 4speed but had a tranny splitter, so they had 8 gears) to the motor. but chances are i wont find the bellhousing, and i want the 5speed. so i guess i will make a converion plate myself as a prototype then have one cut from a solid chunk of steel, unless i feel mine will be strong enough...which i hope it will.

 

Alrighty, let's see if I can explain this a little better. "Highboy" is a term for ALL 67-77.5 F250 4x4's. Parts are easy to find so that's not an issue. The highboy used what's often referred to as a divorced transfer case because it was completely seperate from the transmission. The tranny looked just like a 2wd tranny with a yoke on the tailshaft. Then there's a short driveshaft that goes from the tranny to the t-case input. The divorced t-cases cannot be bolted right up to the tranny like in the F150's and all the later 4x4's. Does this make sense? If it's a late 77 it'll have a married t-case which bolts to a 6-7" adapter that is bolted right onto the back of the tranny. So if it's actually a highboy and you're gonna rob parts off it for this project you'll need to put a 2wd tailshaft housing on your ZF. I'm not sure if you'll need to change the output shaft or not, maybe someone else can tell us. If it's a married T-case it should bolt right up.

 

ok thanks. that clears it up. but i'd just have to go look at the truck next time i go home (next weekend).

 

As far as the Dana 44 goes, the F250 regular cab trucks had dana 44 HD IFS front axles under diesels. The Dana 44 HD front axle is a Bronco front axle that has 8 lug wheels on it. The rest of the axle is exactly the same as the Bronco front axle.

Mine lasted for 250,000 miles, but I did break a lot of stuff on it while plowing snow.

I bought a Dana 60 front axle for 1500 and then spent another 1500 replacing all the bearings and seal and installing a limited slip unit in it.