I have had my Aussie in my 99 for over a year and loved it! Great in the snow! That said....my 99 sits in the driveway with two broke CV's

 

*grins*

 

Get a locker in the rear. I have one and it's great! I have a lock right and it cost me a little over $300. I've wheeled the crap out of my truck. My problem is that I always run out of clearance before I lose traction. Going up a mostly rock ledge I had the front tires a few inches off the ground while the rear was pushing it up. Screwed up my torsion bar bolts and made parts of my underside all shiny but the point is that it worked amazingly well. If I had one in the front I wouldn't have been as screwed so maybe an Aussie Locker could have benifited me, lol. It's my DD and I don't have any problems with it. It clicks around corners as it's an automatic locker. The 8.8 is pretty strong and even though I only have the 28 spline I haven't had any trouble with breaking anything (knock on wood). I have almost 10k miles on it too.

 

just lock 'em both lol

I had the aussie up front, and that thing made gobs of difference! I would imagine a locker in the back would do the same thing, so do 'em both and have the best of both worlds! problem solved lol

as for the 8.8, its a good axle to the person that's gentle to it, hell you can be pretty hard on it by the looks of it. you just can't be me to it and expect it to live.

 

just do a 31spline 8.8 and be cool like me.

 

How wekk does the L/S hold up compared to a locker....cuz i didnt want a locker in the rear cuz i have L/S...i KNOW its not the same...but its better than an open diff

 

The L/S will be nowhere close to a locker. I have a L/S out of a Mustang in my 8.8 that I have done the extra clutch pac in the c/m/c/m/c/m order and have it shimed as tight as possible. Works great on the street,in mud,in snow...but off road as soon as one rear tire is unloaded it will slip and act like an open diff.I have even been in some mud pits where one rear tire had a bite on solid ground but the other didnt and the clutches wouldnt hold and it would one peel.

Makes me mad I through my open diff away so I cant do another AUssie in the rear like I should have done to begin with.

If you do any kind of serious off roading skip the L/S and go with lockers.