on a long bed, ext cab. Why were the trucks not equiped with one from the factory?

There is a drive line shop nearby that has a one piece for 180.00. Is there a real advantage to them?

I would wonder if a drive line that long, being unsupported, would be a little hard on the output end of the transfer case.

Has anyone converted? And was it worth it?

 

My Dodge is not a fire breathing rocket, but it is not exactly stock either. However, I have a '62 Biscayne that does have a very strong, and somewhat radical, 600+ hp 502 big block in it. Both vehicles came from the factory with a 2 piece drive shaft. I had to convert the '62 to a single high speed balanced aluminum shaft to prevent the shattering of U joints each time the street slicks bit in. This is not to mention that the carrier bearing simply could not handle the hp and torque. In the Dodge diesel configuration, the driveline was set up from the factory with larger U joints and more strength for pure torque. I am not really aware of too many people having a big problem with them. There likely are not too many people with a Cummins engine that have a 5500 stall and a line lock. My opinion is that the sudden shock and jolt to the driveline in my '62 necessitated a one piece driveline where, even though there is more torque, the diesel seems to do fine with the two piece setup. Just my 2 cents worth.

 

The reason for a 2 piece driveshaft on the longer trucks is that a long driveshaft tends to start whipping at high speed. 2 short shafts don't have this problem.

 

After years of fighting the thump from a two piece driveshaft Ford went to a single a couple years ago. Haven't heard any complaints...

 

The Dmax engineers designed a sweet aluminum one piece for it.

Don~

 

GM has had quite a few problems with there alum driveshaft.There replacement shafts are now steel.Figure they still need to do some homework on this things
Luc