Just tossing this in here; last weekend I got 13.3 mpg average, driving 200 miles round trip to the local off road park. 37's and 5.43:1

i dont want to dump more than 4k into my cars mods and right now im liking that she is still " all montero" so im kind of opposed to a SAS.

Sounds a 3" body lift and a separate set of rims with 37"s is the way to go.
Im having trouble with this forms search function. Could anyone give me a link to the post where Dat50? fits 37's

True. I didn't bring that up since he clearly wasn't interested in a SAS and that's the only way he'd get those.

In the OEM world, CVs are still not up to the task of 40" tires. At least for any length of time.



When pigs fly.



I do a bit better on 35"s with 5.38s - between 15.5-16.5 MPG city/hwy combined.

Edward

The 'All Montero' is great. Until you have to spend every other weekend replacing stuff and tracking down parts instead of wheeling. I understand "I can't do a SAS because I can't", but "I won't because I want to keep it all Mitsu", I don't.

In the last year I finally had to replace my rear Currie D44 and rebuild my Ford front D44. Both have essentially been untouched and trouble free since 2002 through 400+K miles. Most, if not all, of the parts are less than the Mitsu equivalent and are a LOT easier to find.

I just received my new Stockton 17x9 steel rims and they weight almost 40 lbs apiece. Add another 68lbs for the 35x12.5 tire and the tire/wheel is 110 lbs. A 40x13ish is going to weigh in the realm of 120-130 lbs + a 40 lb rim is a tire/rim combination weighing in at over 160lbs. OEM IFS/RFS just isn't engineered and manufactured to cope with the stresses that kind of weight will produce off road. Not just the CV joints, but the brakes, bushings, steering components, axle shafts, bearings and a box full of other things.

I love my Mitsus - I have four - and I'm definitely not slamming on the quality 'cause they're built a lot better than most other brands, but I have 14 years and 600K (its also my DD) on my '97 Sport SAS driving and wheeling in CO and UT and WILL NEVER go back to seriously wheeling/expedition driving the OEM drive train and suspension.

I know a lot of guys that have rolled $1000s of dollars into suspensions - especially IFS 'cause this is always what the Toy guys do - to decide a couple years latter to do a SAS because they finally figure out that frankly the IFS stuff sucks in comparison to even a mediocre SAS.

Anyway, JMHO. If its going to be a mall crawler, body lift it, lift the suspension a couple inches and put whatever you want under it. But if you're going to seriously wheel it - at the point where you actually want/need upwards of 40s - don't even bother with the stock drive train/suspension. That's just a black hole to toss your money down. Save your cash and do it right the first time.

now where did i put that fire extinguisher??

Edward

Dude, all of the above is said to help you and keep you from spending $$$ and wasting time. How has your's worked with 35's? Don't know what a lunchbox locker is? Google?

Geeze, and I thought I was doing well with 33's!

SO you guys reckon 35's are OK on the Paj cv's? They are a huge tyre as I saw one in the tyre shop last week.

Whether it'd be 'ok' depends on a combination of the tire diameter, width, and weight, rim weight and traction - both the 'road' surface and the 'stickiness' of the tire. And the gearing - both in the t-case(s) and differentials - and gross vehicle weight. And throttle usage.

On a stock drive train - axles 4.20s, 4.60s, 4.90s, and 5.13s & 1.90 t-case - I don't see any huge issues. CoSport ran 35" MT/r's for a couple years and only saw accelerated wear. Keep spare half shafts because blowing a CV isn't impossible. I lost the DS CV with 33"s and a stock drive train and I'm pretty (very) conservative.

Before everyone jumps up and says, 'Oh yea, totally!', KIM that some of us run crawl boxes or doublers that drastically changes the amount of torque (in ft lbs) hitting the wheels. Torque at the wheel flange in 4LO, 1st gear (M/T) on a stock 3.0L Sport is about 6,500 ft lbs. Torque at the wheel flange in 4Lo,Lo,Lo, 1st (M/T) on my '97 is almost 43,000 ft lbs.

The more mass at the wheel, the stronger everything between the engine and wheel flange has to be. Increasing wheel mass hugely increases the stress on every part between the engine and wheel. Then, on top of that, again increasing the force necessary to turn said wheels by increasing the diameter of the wheels.

You can minimize stress WITHIN the drive train with some creative ratios and ratio placement, but wheel mass and diameter generates stress all the way back to the crankshaft and there isn't anything you can do about that. Ok, excluding installing portals.

So, if you're applying upwards of 40,000 ft lbs of torque to the wheel flanges, you can understand where even a relatively small increase in tire/rim weight and/or diameter would be more than enough to start grenading parts like CVs, u-joints and axle shafts.

I would be really nervous about issuing a blanket statement that, oh yea, they'd totally work, after the last few years of running the super deep final drive ratios our vehicles are capable of now.

If 35"s on a stock drive train are pretty ok, and 37"s are mostly ok more or less with modifications like cryo'd CVs but 38"s are just too much, then I'd think that'd move down to 33"s are ok, 37"s are too much, but 35"s would be mostly ok more or less with cryo'd CVs or whatever.

It'd be very useful to have the specs on our CV joints like you can get on u-joints - how many ft-lbs of force they'll take before they grenade at what angles but I've never seen that anywhere.

Of the four of us that I know that use crawl boxes/doublers, you're the only one wheeling with the stock IFS. I don't have any resources - everyone I know wheeling with crawl boxes/doublers runs 37/38+ & heavy bead locks rims. The guys running IFS don't run crawl boxes/doublers and are on 33"s or 35" - mostly 33"s. So, not much can add from there.

IMHO - and this is JUST my personal opinion - I probably wouldn't push it past 33"s, but that's based on my adverse reaction to trail fixes that require major surgery and the fact that I know from experience that loosing a CV/axle shaft/u-joint at the wrong time can be life threatening. Some of the guys may have some ideas that would help, but the math indicates to me at least that there's no way this would be reliable. YMMV. Currie swears to high Heaven that there's no way I could run one of their D44s with my setup for 400K+ miles without issue, but I did. There are a lot of variables in play that my math doesn't take into account, so ....

Edward

You also need to consider the other side of that coin. The lower end of those torque numbers, if you have low low or say 4:1 single low you don't need to apply the power you would have with higher ratios. So without needing to bring up the RPMs to get the power to stay above a stall (or TC stall) your axles won't experience the higher torque or more importantly the shock loads from wheel spin associated with high gears. Having said that, I'm going to dual T-cases and IFS like Ian.


Now Like Edward said, if you gear for big tires and have said big tires in place you will effortlessly grenade CV's if you are not careful. for example; full lock turn, locked and bound up the slightest bump on the gas will probably result in parts flying in LOW LOW

TKs Ed & Toasty, I think i'll stick with 33's for the time being.

Ed you mentioned something about cryo'd cv's , what are they?
I assume they are some sort of upgraded cv, can you get them for Monties/Pajeros?

Cryo treatment can be done on most any metal part and is a process that strengthens the metal on a molecular level. You'd have to find somewhere that does cryo treatment and take/send your disassembled parts to them.