Which rear end for an upgrade?

Except paying more cash and waiting for a machining time you mean? I'd rather have it done correctly the first time, specially since it cost so much. I also don't want to risk the chance of new holes not being drilled exactly centered, something tells me that Currie won't cover that warranty.

I bought 1/2 X 20 X 3" studs and new lug nuts, will make that work.

 

It's your call.
If you drill the holes and screw up, you are in no worse position than you are today. If Currie voids warranty because of that, then they are assholes (Don't think they are), but of course they can't warranty something they don't do, so they can't warranty new holes. It's however truly stupit of them to supply axles specially for Tacomas that don't have the correct studs installed, one must admit.
Drilling those holes is not rocket science. Two things must be correct tho, the diameter of the stud hole's must be correct so the studs will get stuck in them, and the location of them must be correct. The later can be achived by printing out the pattern from a CAD software and glue it the axleshaft. then mark the holes location with a punch and then drill it with a small drill and the again with the correct size drill.

There is another way tho One that I did on a custom camper wagon I made (and put toyota rims on). If the studs you have are bigger (thicker) than the Toyota ones, you can simply have them re-threaded, to toyota specs (12*1.25 if I remember correctly). If the they are not, you can enlarge the current hole's and then put in re-threaded studs

There are no problems, only different solutions

 

I don't wish to drag this out any further or infer that Currie is at fault. They did supply stock length studs probably not knowing that they are too short for use with aftermarket wheels and lug nuts. Had I realized that they drill the axles in an uncommon dia for metric replacements, I would have ordered them drilled different. I'm not going to pay more money to have a machine shop drill new expensive axles when I can just buy standard thread studs and nuts and make it work. I don't like it, but that's why I posted it here. Should someone research this and find this thread, maybe this will help.

 

If I didn't have bad luck I'd have no luck!
Took my axles and new parts in to the machine shop this morning to get the hubs and bearings pressed on, took out the conicle washer, wedding ring retainer, and spring clips out of the new bags and stacked them on his counter while pointing out the correct orientation for them to be assembled. He managed to get one correct and other retainer ring on backwards. After I pointed it out when I went to pick it up, he tells me he'll just press it all out and flip it around! WTF, there's a reason the retaining ring takes a 20 ton press to instal and need to carefully cut off when replacing. I left before getting too pissed off there, said he'd have if fixed by Monday. I'm worried now if he tries to that, it will damage the new wheel bearings. They are not designed to have that much pressure exerted on the side surface.

 

My bad luck continues. Picked up the axle today, was angry to find gouges and chisel strike marks in my new hub, axles is scuffed some, and the backing plate scratched to hell, ABS sensor ring is marked up too. Spent an hour filing and sanding the sharp edges down and cleaning it up. Bolted it up in the housing and found they pressed the the hub in 180* out. Im hoping I can remove all the brake hardware and have enough room to hammer the hub studs out just past the backing plate and rotate it, otherwise it's all got to come apart again.

 

Keep at it! You'll be doing donuts in the parking lot before you know it!

 

Probably a wise decision not to let a machine shop mess with the stud holes...!

 

I got the hub rotated and the brakes reassembled, wheels and tires mounted back up, and measurements taken over the weekend. I called and ordered a Tom Woods driveshaft this afternoon so it's taking shape finally. When the shaft gets here I'll get it bolted up and cut the exhaust off and start moching up the anti wrap bar. I'm seriously considering cutting out the cross bar for the carrier bearing and welding in a better one that has a loop. The stock piece is very weak in appearance.

 

I forget where I saw it, but one guy used a piece of 2" square tubing to replace the cross member and a spare limit strap for the loop.

 

The Tom Woods driveshaft was waiting for me when I got home from work today, it bolted right up as it should! Just waiting on the BAMF shock relocate brackets and I'll have all the parts I need to finish this up. I'm going to use a 2x3 crossmember that competition engineering makes for hot rods for the front mount of the RuffStuff bar. Should have the axle end brackets moched up this weekend.

 

Is it rolling yet?

 

Not yet, have not had the time to finish the bar. Just got back from Cancun last night, hope to make some progress this weekend.

 

Good stuff here ..

 

Done?

 

Sadly, no. I went to Europe for a couple weeks and have been slammed with work and family duties since returning. My back-up daily driver ('87 4Runner) broke down last week and I've been scrambling to get it going again.
I'm pawning off the finish welding of the track bar to a friend and local off road fab guy. I'm going to route the new hard brake lines and bleed them this coming weekend so I can drive it over to his house for him to work on. I'm still waiting on my BAMF shock relocate brackets too, 11 weeks and counting now!

 

Wow. Hope you get it together by the end of summer!

 

Me too. I bought material to weld a new crossmember between the frame for the track bar front shackle mount. I plan to get the truck over to the fab shop tonight. Everything else is together, I drove it out of my shop last weekend. The saga with BAMF and my shock relocates is still on-going, at this point I might just tri-angulate the shocks on another crossmember over the axle and deal with a little added body roll on the road. I'm tired of waiting!

 

Dude I am pretty handy with a grinder. I can build you shock mounts in like ten minutes. I think I even have some pre fabbed ruffstuff mounts laying around. I even have a portable welder. If you need help, let me know. I bet we could get it finished in one day easy.

 

Wow, thanks man, much appreciated!
I figured it wouldn't take a fab guy very long to make a pair and I'll talk to the guy finishing up my RuffStuff bar this weekend. I really need to buy the correct tools and spend some time learning to do basic fab stuff and welding. I'm fairly competent at everything else.

 

It's not that far of a drive down here. I'm about an hour out from Tri-cities. All you need is a grinder with a cut off wheel and a little welder. I have a "readywelder" that runs off car batteries and can single pass 1/2" steel no problem. It also welds aluminum pretty well, and is as easy to use as a squirtgun. A sawzall is handy too, but not required. http://readywelder.com/