found a couple of mid 90 Jeep Cherokee's in the local pull apart that have disk brakes on the solid rear axels, initially I was looking at the disk brakes to put on a 8.25 rear to put under a 68 Barracuda. Then the message got through , "get the complete rear end". But I did not have a tape with me,, anyone know how the width of a 8.25 Cherokee axel matches to an A body?
Be warned there are two rear axels , a Dana 35 and the Chrysler 8.25 in these.

thanks

Putting Jeep disk brakes on a 8.25 axle.

http://www.geocities.com/dcpaschal/mitch.html

Hi Kesteb, sorry to break into this post without having some useful info, but the link in your post is DEAD. Geocities does not exist anymore, lots of good sites just disappeared; yahoo bought it and closed it! You may have some broken picture links too?
Olaf

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Aspenized

I pulled one from a 97 grand cherokee,I remember the wheel flange to flange being about 60 1/2 inches,too wide for an A-body,but would work nice in a B or E body.

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V8?? We don't need no stink'n V8!!

I remember measuring backing plate to backing plate on one back when I worked in the garage; and a sI remember it was damn close to being the same as my F body 8-1/4.
Thanks to my son who totalled my wife's Cherokee ("XJ" not Grand) that had a D35 rear, I replaced it with another Cherokee that happens to have an 8-1/4 in it instead. and I have an F body version here too. Might take me a couple days to get it from the wife (she drives the Cherokee as her daily back n forth to work vehicle) but I'll measure when I get the chance the next few days.

Based on axle lengths from Randy's Ring and Pinion website, the early 5 bolt Grand Cherokee rearend would calc out to be about 60.5" wide, with drums (29.875 x 2 plus 5/8" cross shaft and 1/8" for both drums). That agree's with bigslant6fan's number, so I would call it a match.

Looks like an "XJ" might use the same rear axle, again based on Randy's website showing the same axle length, but I'm not up on Jeeps so I could be mis-informed.

The later axles get longer, and have a 6 bolt lug pattern, so I would guess they would be prohibitively difficult to swap.

The F-Body rearend I have in my Valiant measured about 59.5" wide, drum to drum (plus or minus). It just fits under the car with the deep offset (+30mm offset) Ford wheels I have under the car.

I would guess that being 1" wider, you would need some wheels that measure about +45mm of offset. You could check out some of the later Mustang wheels (2005 and later), I think they measure close to that but I don't remember off the top of my head. Or, you could go custom.

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'15 Chrysler 200S V6
'74 Duster 360, factory 4 speed car

I was measuring from inside of backing plate to inside of backing plate when I measured a few years back (at least 5 since I worked at the alignment shop and I seem to remember the XJ being ~54" Add for the widths of the drums, with the shoes etc being under them (so included in the measurement that way) figuring the shoes are 2-1/2" wide themselves, then I can believe ~60"ish end to end.
1" of overall length dont sseem like it would really hurt anything; I don't know that you'd need any "special offset" wheels but I guess that would depend on what size tires you run. Considering that you might need custom offset with a regular F body rear. they did make a Dana 44 for the XJ for a few years. might be a decent option. I'd stay away from the ones in a Grand Cherokee especially the aluminum case 44. They eat carrier bearings and there were service bulletins about not jacking them up under the axle tubes, they can distort under their own weight

The problem is, the stock A-Body axle is something like 57" or 57.125" wide, so an F-Body axle is close to 2.5" wider already, add the extra 1" and you have 1.75" per side of extra width to deal with.

To fit it under an A-Body, you are going to need deeper wheels or a set of serious air-shocks.

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'15 Chrysler 200S V6
'74 Duster 360, factory 4 speed car

D'uh.... being that I have an F body here and I was looking at possibly putting a Cherokee axle in that, and that I didn't go back and re read the whole thread as it progressed, I forgot about the reference to the A body. Yeah, I could definitely see it being a problem there. But if you were to get a 97+, 29 spline version and cut it down? The 29 spline is supposed to be stronger than the 96 and down 27 spline.

I could see that being an option, just have to see how much axle you have to work with to get it cut and resplined (much like the big bolt A-Body axle swap deal). Watch the bolt pattern though, so you don't have to run Dakota wheels in the back.

I wonder if the Dakota and Viper bolt patterns match, maybe you could swap Viper wheels in the back if you had 6 bolt axles.

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'15 Chrysler 200S V6
'74 Duster 360, factory 4 speed car

Dakota; OK if you stop looking when you get newer than '90; otherwise all XJ Cherokees were 5 on 4-1/2. and these days the yards have plenty of those due to cash for "clunkers".

I was thinking the Jeeps went to 6 bolt wheels, too. You're right though, only the Dakota's got screwed up.

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'15 Chrysler 200S V6
'74 Duster 360, factory 4 speed car

I really like to one stop shop,, to replace the 7.25 and drums with a 8.25 with disks, and knowing that the local pull a parts in this area seem to charge only for the big item and let the smaller stuff that is bolted on go for free, I believe i can buy the axle and diff and get the disks for free. I have never lost money by getting things done right the first time, For reliability purposes I plan to rebuild the salvage yard axle I end up with, so it is likely that having the axels and housing shortened will be a small addition to the cost of the project.

I'll put together a spread sheet with the prices I'm getting, to see if as a package with disks ... it makes sense.

yes, the Durango 8 1/4 rears were beefed up with their introduction in 97.
The axle's are thicker and has more splines and the ring gear was enlarged to (roughly) 8 3/8. This was all done in an effort to make them live under the heavy Durango. Not sure if jeep followed suit with the internal upgrades. However, the jeep 5 on 4 1/2 wheel has the same bolt pattern and (MOST IMPORTANT) the same size center register as the old mopars 4 1/2 bolt pattern. These wheels also had more offset to the inside but not a ton, like the ford wheels. (check out a newer crown victoria, tons of offset to the inside). Also it depends what A-boby you are talking about. The duster had alot of room under them, others did not.

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1979 W150 Shortbox
225, NP435, 9 1/4, Dana 44

The Good Life.

INITIATING OLD THREAD RESURRECTION

Okay, so I've been looking at putting an 8.25" under my '64 Dart and found references on FABO and this site to the XJ Cherokees, which are FAR more prevalent in junkyards nowadays than late A-bodies or F-bodies. I'm already running 1" thick bolt pattern adapters on my stock 7.25" axle, so I don't think the additional inch or so per side will be a problem. (I'm currently using 17x7" wheels with a nearly 2" offset from a late 90s Chrysler.)

My questions relate to the other stuff. I know I'll have to have the driveshaft shortened, and I've found other posts here saying that the 8.25" uses the same rear U-joint. Is this still true with the Jeeps? i.e., will I need to graft on the back of the Jeep driveshaft, or can I just shorten the one I have?

I understand I'll also need bigger U-bolts, and I'll therefore have to either egg out the holes in my shock plates, or get some shock plates to match. I doubt I can get these from the Cherokee. What cars will have shock plates I can use?

Finally, the spring perches. I saw a post in one of the threads I searched (can't remember where now) that said the spring perches on the Cherokee 8.25 lined up perfectly, but this may have been for an F-body, not an A-body. Assuming I need to move the spring perches on the axle, where can I buy new ones? I've heard previously that these are an available aftermarket part, but I haven't had any luck yet finding them.

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Somehow I ended up owning three 1964 slant six A-bodies. I race one of them.
Escape Velocity Racing