Ant difference between CJ Dana 30 stub shafts? & brake rotor thickness preference?

I have been collecting a pile of parts for my 1970 left hand drive DJ5 conversion for a while, and this past weekend acquired two CJ Dana 30 narrow track front axles. I plan on running one of them, and pulling the axleshafts and other commonly broken parts as trail spares from the other. One axle is a '78 model with the thicker disc brakes and 6 bolt locking hubs, the other is the newer type with the narrow disc and 5 bolt locking hubs. My question is this, are the CJ Dana 30 axle stub shafts all the same, same length etc?

My other question is this, is there a preference in the thin rotor setup versus the thick rotor setup? Since I have an axle with each type of disc setup, is there an advantage to running one versus the other? The '78 axle has factory 4.10 gears, and I figured I'd just re-gear my rear Dana 44 to match it along with installing a traction device at the same time.

Stevo

 

Re: Ant difference between CJ Dana 30 stub shafts? & brake rotor thickness preference

What lynn said is pretty much spot on. Given the 2 options you have, the 78 with thick rotors, 6 bolt hubs, and 4.10's is pretty much the ultimate factory CJ dana 30. The later 5 bolt, thin rotor axle is much less desirable.

The knuckles are different for drums, thick rotor, and thin rotor. They can be changed between axles, but you can not run thin rotors on thick knuckles and vice versa.

Definitely keep the 6 bolt hubs.

I've got 6 bolt hubs and thin rotors on my cj and it works fine.

 

Re: Ant difference between CJ Dana 30 stub shafts? & brake rotor thickness preference

Just to add one more thing here. The disc brake stub axles on CJ's are all the same. The drum brake and disc brakes are different but can interchange. The difference is the diameter of the step on the stub axle where the seal fits against that's in the back of the spindle. Not the little v seal for the inner spindle to axle bearing but the larger one that is pressed in for drum brakes and is a tight stretch fit over the step of the stub on disc brake stubs.

 

Re: Ant difference between CJ Dana 30 stub shafts? & brake rotor thickness preference

Thanks for the replies. I was hoping I could use the axleshaft assemblies as trail spares, without needing to swap stub shafts. When I get a bit further in the build I'll post some pics and details in the early Jeep section, since it is actually a '70 model.

Stevo