[zookernator]

Heres some info I wrote up for a mate on bracing/strengthening sierra transfer cases/mounts.. might be of some use for someone I'm not saying this is right or wrong.. this is what my opinion is, and this set up works very well in my bus!!

When you install reduction gears into the transfer, you get heaps more load/tourqe going through the housing. Although to do a reliable/tough as nuts job.. you need to brace more than just the housing.

If you strengthen the housing, the huge load is then transfered to the rubber mounts, brace these up the load is then transfered to the mounting brackets.. brace them up and its then onto the chassis... and you wont bust that!!! When i first got my zook.. she was pretty much stocko, so i've done heaps of searching and stuff about all sorts, so i'll pass on what i think is best, and what i did!!

First, buy or make a 'rocktoy ring'. These are quite cheap to buy, and will strengthen the housing. The ring will pick up most of your bolt holes that hold the transfer together.. some of the holes may need spacing with some washers though to pick up the spare space (as there may be a gap between the ring and the housing).

Next is the mounts that the ring MUST be welded to. You will have the standard ones on there now.. use these as templates. What i did, is made a new passenger side mount by using thick plate.. just bend it, drill it and that one is done. For the drivers side, i reinforced the standard mount by running RHS inside of it. Just gotta bend the RHS to suit the shape of the original mount, then weld him in. Make sure you get these welded to the ring though.. other wise it wont be anywhere near as strong! The transfer housing and mounts should now be tough as nails.

Next is the rubber mounts, the originals bust VERY easy!! Again you can buy aftermarket kits quite cheap.. or you can make them. To make them, you will need some rubber blocks or something similar, long high tensile bolts, and big washers. This is hard to explain.. but the factory rubber has to compress and/or pull.. depending if your in reverse or forward. So you need to make the new mounts so there are seperate rubbers (x3 per mount) to do this (instead of the x1 original type). This will definatly be strong enough.. even if you plan on going big mud tires and lockers later on. This will now put the load onto the chassis.

I didn't brace my first housing.. and I shattered my "new" reduction gears after 1400k's without this setup:( After replacing the gears and housing, I only put the roctoy ring on.. and it kept busting the rubber mounts and started to bend the steel transfer mounts. Myself and many others run this setup, and its very strong and reliable. Make sure you use high tensile bolts, my old standard bolts bent.. Thats how much strain goes through the transfer!!! Hope i made sence.. heres some piccies:

Here you can see 2 of the rubber mounts (theres one more on top).. and the beefed up steel mount.


Welded together..



Welded together again..







This is where we ran the extra piece of RHS inside the original mount..

[vl2dy4]

Great post mate i will need to do this to my mighty kong before it goes in my zook.

Conrad

[vl2dy4]

Where did you get the bushes from?

[zookernator]

vl2dy4 wrote:

Where did you get the bushes from?

Had them layin around at work.. theres a place here called total rubber supplies.. I reckon places that would have them too

[vl2dy4]

I ended up cutting a whole lot of 12mm Green Poly wear plate up from work and ended up lifting the transfer case around 1" overstandard.

I used a 40mm Hole saw and cut 5x 12mm spacers per mount. Then used a long 12mm bolt with washers and nyloc nuts.

I have noticed the increase in driveline harshness, but that is understandable considering i went from rooted rubber mounts to Hard Wearing Nylon board. It does have a small amount of give in it but really it is pretty much solid mounted.

The only drawback i can see is the increased noise transferred through the chassis.

Also the transfer case doesnt seem to flop around like it did before.

Conrad

[JrZook]

Very good idea on the single mount side. A push-pull setup so that the loaded mount is always compressed! This is the way it should have been from factory.

[tanshi]

yep very similar to how i have done mine

[oozuk]

vl2dy4 wrote:

Great post mate i will need to do this to my mighty kong before it goes in my zook.

Conrad

like so ?

[jase84]

where did you get the rocktoy ring from mate ? or did you make it ?

cheers jase

[oozuk]

jase84 wrote:

where did you get the rocktoy ring from mate ? or did you make it ?

cheers jase

From a guy on outerlimits username rocktoy, he laser cuts them in bulk for sale.

[taszook]

roughly how much for rocktoy ring? cbf going on outers, havent been on that site in years

[boostedbrick]

taszook wrote:

roughly how much for rocktoy ring? cbf going on outers, havent been on that site in years

There $75 with postage for a leafy... Check his site below.
http://www.designfab.com.au/

[taszook]

thanks. about to order a mighty kong, might have to use a rocktoy with it like the pic above

[bucketnut]

liking the box mount for drivers sid. i went to the trouble of fabricating a newwy out of 5mm just the same as stock