By Chris in Tech

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I thought I’d take some pics and provide a little more insight in how to set up our Solid Axle Widening Kit.

The IFS rear axle housing has a wider offset than the stock solid front axle Hilux, and swapping out your rear end on your solid front lux with an IFS rear end is a great way to get some extra width without having to run wheel spacers.

The issue then becomes how to get the solid front width to match that of the wider IFS rear. The answer is to fit a Solid Axle Widening Kit. (This kit is also popular when doing a Solid Axle Swap on an IFS Hilux/4 Runner to get the track to match without running spacers.)

The IFS Hub has a greater offset wheel flange as can be seen in the below picture

On the left is the stock solid front axle hub and on the right is the IFS hub, you can see the wheel flange has a wider offset on the IFS hub than the solid front axle hub.

The main component to the kit is a spacer which fits between the IFS hub and the solid front axle rotor, the spacers purpose is to align the caliper mounting position to the rotor.

Installation is very simple, and here we will look at preparing and fitting the ifs hub to the solid front axle rotor ready to install back onto the solid front axle. We’ll assume we have a solid front axle stripped down to the spindle, and have removed the rotor from the solid front axle hub.

The first thing you need to do is get hold of an IFS Hub. The IFS Hubs bolt to the rotor, so you are best to get the hub and rotor assembly complete as you will need to re use the bolts that bolt the hub to the rotor.

Remove the bolts holding the IFS Rotor to the IFS Hub and give the hub a few taps to set it free, discard the IFS Rotors and give the hub a bit of a clean up, if needed now is a good time to replace the wheel studs, and you may as well replace the wheel bearings as well whilst it is all apart.

Place the IFS Hub so the wheel studs are facing down and then place the spacer on top as shown in the above picture. Use the bolts that originally held the IFS Rotor to the IFS Hub to bolt the spacer to the hub. You will need to give the spacer a bit of a tap to get it on. Put some Blue Locktite on the threads and tighten them up to 80 ft lbs in a star pattern to make sure it aligns itself true. Give a couple more taps and retighten.

Now place your solid front axle rotor on top of the spacer and bolt it on using the supplied socket head caps and the 2 rotor retaining bolts from your solid front rotor. Use some blue locktite and torque up to 80 ft lbs.

All thats left to do is replace the hub assembly back on the front axle, refit the hub flange or free wheeling hub and bolt up the calipers and you have an extra 3″ of track.

By Chris in Tech

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They’ve been around for years, cheap reliable traction that is easy to install in your stock open centre. Often referred to as Lunchbox lockers, these automatic lockers consist of 2 bi-directional dog clutches which lock both axles like a spool when torque is applied and when torque is not being applied disengage to allow one wheel to turn faster than the other, which is what happens when you turn.

There are a couple of variations of the lunchbox locker on the market, and I thought I would take some time to show the differences between the old faithful Lockright from Richmond Gear and the new kid on the block the Spartan made by Yukon.

The two lockers pictured are both for solid front Hilux 2 Pinion diff.

The boxes look remarkably different, however once you pull them out of the box, they look almost identical.

Both consist of a driver, a coupler and a spacer and a bag of springs and pins. I put them on the scales and the Lockright weighs 2.1kg’s and the Spartan 2.15kgs.

The main difference between the two is the pin system. The Lockright has smaller pins and one small spring that fits inside a larger spring per pin. The Spartan has larger pins, almost double the size and one medium size spring per pin.

The way you install the pins and springs into the locker is also different, installing the springs into the Lockright you need to use a small screwdriver to seat them into the driver, whereas the Spartan comes with 4 spring retainers allowing you to push the springs into the driver and lock them in, once installed into the carrier you simply pull the retainers.

So there you have it, a basic overview of the difference between the Lockright and the Spartan Lockers.

Happy Wheeling.

By Chris in Tech

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It is a common belief in the aftermarket that there are two different 8″ Toyota Ring and Pinions – the “V6″ and the “4cyl”. Whilst it is true that there are two different designs, the name given is misleading.

In actuality the Ring and Pinions that most refer to as a “4Cyl” are simply the thinner 85 and older pinion head design. The Ring and Pinions that most refer to as the “V6″ are actually found in all 86+ 8″ diffs, regardless of engine type. The actual difference between the V6 and 4CYL vehicles is that the V6 does have a different housing and different pinion and carrier bearings.

The above pic shows the difference in the pinion head length between the two types of ring and pinion.

The above pic shows the difference in the bearing thickness between the two types of ring and pinion.

Our main differential supplier, Nitro Gear have superseded the older type of ring and pinion for a number of reasons :

1. The older style pinion head is smaller and offers less material and strength.
2. 1985 is a long time ago and there are more vehicles out there using the 86+ style.
3. Less part numbers make inventory and ordering more simple.

So if you have an older model Toyota 8″ you just need to use the appropriate 86+ pinion bearing when installing your ring and pinion. Toyota part number for the correct bearing is 90366-35044

Info and images supplied by Nitro Gear

By Chris in Tech

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Want to fit aftermarket gears in your factory 4.875 diff housing? You can’t and here’s why.

The factory 4.875 diff centre uses a thinner ring gear than the other OEM ratio’s and to accomodate this Toyota made a different housing that offset the pinion closer to the centre of the diff.

The aftermarket made all of their ratio’s the same thickness as the other non 4.875 ratio’s, so the ring gear is thicker and will not fit in the factory 4.875 housing. The only gear that will go in one of these factory 4.875 housings is the thin factory 4.875 ring gear.

If you check out the photo above you can see the difference between the two. On the left is the factory 4.3 and on the right is the factory 4.875. Note that the pinion hole is offset to the centre on the factory 4.875.

So bottom line is if you have the factory 4.875 and bust a ring and pinion you will need a new centre if you want to fit aftermarket 4.88’s.