OOOOH, rxnhead, now you got my special place thinking. I think this is gonna be the crawler I keep this time and I'd really like to have a fuel injected simple swap and I know Im one of the few but I like manual crawlers with Heavy duty clutches.
I like to use a hand throttle with my feet working the clutch and brakes. I will probably end up going the way of a Currie 9" in the rear and a super stout 44 built by Dynatrac with Ox lockers in both ends.
No air or power lines to worry about and they will take a beating when properly built.
For anyone thinking of doing an SAS with a Rubicon 44, you might want to think again. While normal shafts are okay in them, I have seen a few grenade with upgraded shafts if you get to bouncing or in a spot with all the power required of one wheel.
I had never thought about a 302HO though? Will the Tremec 5 speed fit and still have enough room to get a transfer case in there? And what one would you go in search of? I'd like to keep 4.88's in the axles and go to at least a 4:1 crawl ratio maybe lower. Im a major rock junkie.
You can have that mud, you spend a couple of hours playing and 2 days cleaning. When I figure out how, im gonna post up some pics of my old Jeep crawling at Rausch Creek in the "rock garden" (basically small suv sized rocks, pointy as all get out, with the occasional giant hole to fall in if you dont have a good spotter

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I wish there were more spots in the midwest that offered more than mud and sand.