What are portal axles?

 

they come on Unimog's. they are a straight axle with a under drive unit at the end of the axle.

here is some info on them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal_gear

 

wo0t Portals friggin' Rock!!! I found a couple places that will make them custom for you!

www.portaltek.com
www.stazworks.com

PortalTek does a 9" diff with Custom portal outters and you can get CTIS (Central Tire Inflation System) like H1s and you can get 8-Lug disc brakes so you can run almost any wheels you want...

Stazworks uses a 9" diff and Hummer portals... which some may think is a bad idea, because supposedly the Hummer portals aren't very strong. They don't offer CTIS, but they do offer Hydraulic Rear Steering setups.

The vehicles that come with portals are the Mercedes Unimogs 404, 406, 410/411; Volvo C303s (which are only 60" wide); Pinzgauers (can get 6x6s too)...

When you put them on your stock suspension, they give you about 5" of lift, so with about 2-3" lifted suspension and Portals, you could run 37s or 40s if you don't like the stock bodyparts...

And with 40s you'll have about 18.5" of clearance underneath the diff... try that with anyother axle!!

The only downside to portals is that the cost is extremely high (anywhere from 2k-5k for a set) and replacement parts are also very expensive...

 

I hope that wasn't a serious answer...

 

Mmmm... portals.

 

Wow. Never heard of them before. Good info guys. My wealth of vehicular knowledge just increased. Haha...

 

Just found out those Portal Tek axles run $9k-$13K + options!!!

 

So basically portals offer a way to raise the rear axle, as well as so other added benefits.

 

yeah, but you have to run them as a set and with stock gearing like 7.62's you won't be seeing much over 40 mph

 

yea well if your going to spend that much on axles its probably for an offroad rig

 

You can use the hummer portals on the raod, because the ratio is something low like 1.4:1 but that is still kind of high like with 3.73s you could run 37s or 38s... haha.

 

Hummers have 4 wheel IFS don't they?

The two primary benefits of portals is that they increase the under-differential ground clearance greatly without having to add larger tires, and the reduction boxes on the end, which will give you a greater overall crawl ratio. That's good for added traction and torque.

 

yes...