Anyone ever deal with Cary at CT performance? Hell of a nice guy.

I have a stock TTB front axl on my 4x4 96 powerstroke f250. My front end needs some serious work so I called the highly recommended CT performance where he gave me the bad news. He won't sell me part nor support my crap of a front axl. I must say I truly respect someone though that won't just sell you parts.

Anyway, long story short he told me to swap in a dana 60. I have found a few dana 60's but nervous as to how im going to do the swap. I don't have a garage (i have a tent/canopy) and not really sure what i'm doing. I'm mechanically inclined but like a little heads up as to what I'm doing before i get into a project. Anyone have input, suggestions, etc...

The other problem i'm going to have is gearing. How do I know what my rear axl ratio is? If I had to guess i'd say its a 4:11 but that's just a complete guess.... did ford stamp the rear axl? Can I just drop the rear pumpkin cover and count the teeth on the ring gear? How do I find a comparable match to my front. I was told that I need to have matching differential gearing or you'll blow up the transfer case.


Any help is much appreciated.

 

Ford Axle Code Chart .: Articles Look at the axle code on your door sticker and compare to this chart (ignore where it says 1991).
There is a ton of info on what you want to do, so do a search of the whole forum and enter "sas" or "d60 swap" into the advanced search box.

 

Your front axle is not "crap". They are just not as strong as a Dana 60. You trade that strength for the much nicer ride you get from an independent front suspension. I hope you understand what you're getting into. Unless you run a snowplow service in the winter, or intend to lift the truck and put huge tires on it, or just outright abuse the truck, your Dana 50 TTB will work just fine. What's wrong with it?

 

well for starters I can't keep the thing aligned. It's eating my $350 tires like no tomorrow. I started with replacing the ball joints and then was on my way to do springs, shocks and shackle bushings. I called CT Performance and he basically explained that you're throwing good money after bad in regards to the dana 50. Not saying it's bad per-se just saying the design is poor and after 20,000 miles with fresh bushings, etc it'll just wear out and you're back to having tire problems. He also claims that there is no reason for a truck to ride smooth just because it's a truck. My friend who recomended CT performance to me also said the same thing. That his excursion felt like a truck until he made some mods that cary suggested.

Any reason why a TTB front end "rides nicer" than say a Dana 60? Serious question here... I like to have as much background before I start doing crazy things like swap out a front axl that's going to require a lot of run-around and part searching.

Thanks for the input!!!

Al