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I am speechless to man. I saw this last night and went Oh crap...so I think I know the solution: get an auto XJ and swap your parts over....

I have never heard of this many broken bell housings on any rig.
 
OR..
you can work with like Novak and be the first to invent some super HD bell housing for the AX15...
 
Something has to be causing your drivetrain to see more than usual torsional twisting. Have you tried putting a limit strap on the driver side if the motor?
 
Something has to be causing your drivetrain to see more than usual torsional twisting. Have you tried putting a limit strap on the driver side if the motor?

Mike is onto something here. limit straps on both sides of the motor might just do it (and add rubber mounts)

I've seen guys use straps and/or chain for preventing motor mount breakage .
I actually had welded chain to my old scout II and bolted it to the motor to keep it from torquing over and breaking motor mounts . I honestly think Poly mounts will only make it all worse though since they wont flex something has too, so its the bell housing that does work. Consider limit straps on both sides of the motor, rubber mounts, and beefy X member, more frame plating, and a frame cross brace from frame to frame to prevent any twisting.

any frame cracking anywhere?

what about some across frame bracing to keep the thing from tweaking?
how is your Xmember? Maybe consider a 1/4" 2x6 X member, perhaps yours is flexing out too much if its the factory sheet metal.

what about the tranny input bottoming out? are you missing any sort of spacer or washer in some sort of tranny input?

I wonder if your frame is tweaked at all , maybe with the cage pulling/twisting it? I doubt that , I am just shooting in the dark.
 
I haven't done motor limit straps. In my opinion that won't really change much. Neither will motor mounts. I've broken something 5 times now with stock rubber mounts and then again with poly. It's gonna break either way. The motor barely moves now with the poly mounts, so I'm not sure that strapping it will make much if a difference, especially seeing that going from mushy loose stock motor mounts to firm poly mounts made no difference whatsoever.

Just inspected for cracks in the unibody up front and saw nothing. How can I check to see if it's square with the motor and trans still in it?

My stock trans mount is re enforced with some scrap metal I had lying around. With that along with the tcase skid I have on there, I'd assume it would be pretty rigid. The crossmember has no cracks or years in it either.

I'll look up a breakdown diagram of the inside of the bellhousing and see if I have missed anything.

At this point, if I can't come up with any sure fire way to fix the thing, I'm done with it. The past two breakages have occurred within 2-300 miles of being put back together. I can't just keep taking random shots in the dark and expecting it to fix it.
 
Tim, I remembered your recommendation about steel aftermarket bellhousings earlier today. I searched summit and jegs on my lunch break today and didn't see anything. I'll try to give Lakewood a call tomorrow on my lunch break. Anybody else you'd recommend I call?
 
loose bell housing bolts, mis aligned motor and/or tranny mounts?
also, using a urethane tranny mount can do it. did it crack before you switched the tranny mount back to rubber maybe?

are you using the bolts as you tighten them to pull the engine and tranny together?


find a local shop to weld the crap out of it, and add additional plating


could it be the starter? have you replaced the starter in all of this? might be worth doing?


what about some sort of spacer or gasket to give you a few extra thousandths between the engine and tranny too in case something is bottoming out ?

also, hard mounts can be the cause.

also bad or binding U joints could possibly be causing it. Got any bind in your drive train?



lets say you get a custom lakewood bell housing for 400$, but you don't fix the root cause? then you start breaking other crap like who knows what, t case housing maybe.?


my gut tells me find a machine shop that well weld it up, and add tons of gusseting. go to all rubber mounts, make sure your U joints are all in good shape, and make sure you are properly aligning the thing and not overtorquing anything either. I would imagine over torquing and under torquing could cause it too.

or get a lakewood bell housing.

so new rubber mounts all around, new Ujoints too, and proper torque. and weld and gusset and plate the crap out of one of your old bell housings, find a place to weld it. probably cost you like 50-100$ for the cracks to be ground down and welded, and then add gusseting.


you are sure nothing is out of alignment?


Don't give up, you are almost there man. just keep at it. Worst case is you miss a month or two of wheeling in 2014 but get to wheel for years to come. Ive heard lakewood would be legit if they make a ax15 bell housing.
 
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Well The jeep has been neglected recently. It's barely moved in a few weeks. Went on a trip to Europe for 2 weeks and then last weekend I went to the Rubicon with some buddies to celebrate my 21st. Had a good time (although we didn't get to meet up with half the group) and it lit the fire under my butt to get back to work on the jeep.

I rode shotgun in my buddies 12v cummins powered highboy on 37s. Things a beast.

Climbing ice house.

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Phone booth

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Dropping down the bowl on the way out.

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Did this whole thing again when I got home

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^^^ you guys have no idea how many different pictures I have of me doing that same thing different times lol


I ordered a real AA SYE and a new bellhousing the other day. My latest thought is that my ****ing gnarly driveline vibes are killing the bellhousings. Took the driveshaft off and put the jeep in gear and let the yoke spin and saw the hack n tap yoke wobbling (not seated right? Idk. Don't care). It was janky as faaaawk so I'm not surprised it kicked itself crooked. Glad to be getting rid of it and having smooth drivelines regardless of wether or not it fixes the bellhousing issue.

Rubicon trip stat. Because Rubicon runs are the best test runs, right? Worked out well for me last time (ha jk broke a bellhousing).

Now if only my SYE would actually show up, I could get back to work. Next day shipping my butt!
 
I feel you frustration with trying to get the heap to work correctly. Put new axels under mine in March and I am still working out the bugs one at a time. Working on the heap on weekends,18, wheeling in the mountains 0.
 
Looking forward to wheeling with you too Gordo!

Skip, yeah you've been fighting that for a while! You gonna make it to the sierrafest?


Josh, we were at spider all day Saturday and then camped on top of the granite bowl Saturday night. Connor didn't wheel with us after the wentworth springs split on the way in. Were you with the NorCal jeepers?
 
Sounds like fun josh. When you get a new rig let's head out there!


Got the SYE in the mail today. Just finished installing it a few minutes ago. I freaking hate snap rings. That is all.

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I still need to torque the yokes. It calls for 140-150ft/lbs of torque... How important is that? I really don't want to figure out a way to hold the yoke while I torque it. I'm thinking of just sticking my impact on there. Thoughts? She's a strong impact.


Also looking for a long rear driveshaft. Probably out of a V8 automatic grand cherokee. Haven't out the trans back in to measure but that's likely what I'll need. Anybody have one they'd be willing to part with?

Slick rock tomorrow (today technically). Wish me luck haha
 
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Pipe wrenches work great for that process. Pipe wrench on the base of the yoke in one hand. Torque wrench in the other. CHEST FLY TIME. Done alot of that this week doing the crush sleeve on the 8.8. It takes like 250 lb/ft of torque to crush.
 
Sounds like I'll be getting my monthly workout today. Thanks for the idea though. I'll give it a shot after work!
 
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