It's funny you say that... my best friend has a truck almost identical to mine, running a Dixon kit and 33's on his '02 FX4 with a manual t-case. That truck and it's 4wd system has been FAR less reliable than my old clunky PVH set up.

The Live Axle set up has two major design flaws in that you have to have the axle shaft bolted in place to hold the hub/bearings together and the axle shaft is always connected and spinning. Sure this is great if it's all together and working, but when you break a CV you're in trouble. Big trouble. To the point of not being able to drive the truck. With a manual hub set up if you break an axle in any way you can either unlock the hub and keep going, or pull the shaft out completely and still get home.

Anyway, there's the one and only pro-PVH rant you'll probably here... lol

I sure do wish Warn made a hub for our truck tough...

 

Ain't that the truth. Really, Ford should jus start puttin dana 30 or 44's in the rangers. and then give optional things like air lockers and tough looking bumpers.

Jeep could use a good competitor anyways. Am i the only one who gets sick of hearing about them?

 

Well i went ahead and ordered some "wheel seals" when i got this bearing and i could tell as soon as i put a new one in that i needed them, they kind of support the cv and before my cv would just lay in the assembly unless the hub was in there supporting it. So i put those and a brand new bearing on the drivers side last night and i greased the back of the assembly and where the cv goes in. Pretty much everywhere there was crack on the assembly i put some grease over it for extra protection. I'm gunna take the passenger side apart saturday and put the new wheel seal in and grease the crap out of that bearing too. I just installed that one 2 weeks ago and it hasnt seen any action yet so its still good. Then sunday, the mazda is makin a 4 hour drive to Mudfest and then a 4 hour drive back that night. And it'll see some action while im there so we will see how they hold up. Oh, and i also pulled the vacuum lines off and put sealant in the hard line and rubber line. I just cut the rubber line by the frame and sealed it up there. Thanks for all the help dudes.

 

The guy I met at SEMA like 4 years back??? lol. If I remember correctly, he's putting down some pretty good power too...

I'm just going by what I've seen through the years regarding the PVH setup. I see the pros/cons of both and I appreciate your comments. If the CV split in half on my truck, I *could* nurse it along so long the outsite 'cup' was still bolted to the bearing and the other half was still e-clipped in the axle. No issues of losing fluid everywhere and no issues of a bearing tearing itself apart.

But I do agree with ya and most people...I do wish we actually had decent options for manual locking hubs and keeping the IFS. Warn hubs would make me reconsider my previous PVH hate. lol.

 

Spive's old truck? How is that thing doing anyway? It seems like I remember that truck getting a super charger at some point a while back...
Has he killed a lot of CV joints? Has he upgraded to 930s or whatever? Have you had problems since you upgraded?