TORX's Hypothesis:
During Thursday's trail run we were on Lilly Pond trail. On the last section of trail I managed to tag a rock HARD with my front diff. It was one of those situations where I wasn't paying attention, and the rock snuck up on me. My own dumb fault.
At the time the hit almost brought the Jeep to a stop. I was in first gear low range so I wasn't going fast, but we were going down hill so gravity defintely help with the magnitude of the hit. It also rung the front diff like a church bell, a sound I've never heard before come from tagging a rock.
I got out after to take a look and make sure I didn't hit my steering, and all I saw was a little bit of rock rash on my Ruff Stuff diff cover. Props to Ruff Stuff for making a diff cover that will break a housing before their cover.
Over the next two days of wheeling, and then the drive home the crack and damage began to spread. During Saturday's run Eric and I heard some mystery noises coming from the front end. I attributed it to the front Detroit just unloading.
On the drive home at highway speed I heard a low pitch groan coming from the front end. It didn't sound too bad compared to other noises I've heard in the past, so I ran with it. I'm really hoping the crack in the housing didn't mess up the gear back lash. Looking back I was hearing more noise during deceleration. I hope the gears are still salvageable.
Then a few miles from home the front Detroit started popping hard on any sort of turn. I thought I may have spit a u-joint cap, or broke the Detroit. Once I got home I put a jack under the axle and realized I was taking up the slack in the housing before lifting a tire. FML.
I guess it could have been worse. It could have completely cracked in half on the trail, or come apart on the highway.
I had very few issues with my last D30 after five years of trail abuse, so I'm not going to preach trusses are a requirement. In fact I didn't truss this axle because of that. I didn't think I'd have any issues with the housing. Unfortunately, I found a weak link, and proved myself wrong.
Right now, I'm really lacking motivation to fix it. I won't lie yesterday I started at it for awhile and had part out thoughts go through my head. It'll get fixed, but it was such an unexpected break I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.
I'm going to work on getting the axle yarded out today, and stripped down. A 44 isn't an option, nor do I blame the break on it being a "30". The most logical thing to do right now is find a new housing. Cross my fingers the 4.56's and Detroit survived and transfer them over. Then I'll make a truss for the passenger side, that ties in the chunk to the tube. Hell, maybe I'll join the Sleeved D30 Cool Kid's Club too.
I really need to find a new hobby.