Spot The Difference

Not all AX15 gearboxes are the same, the other day I was helping a friend to change the gearbox out of his 1998 TJ Wrangler, the box we were fitting was supplied by a local breakers, as a Wrangler TJ gearbox. Everything went smoothly till it was time to fit the transmission belly pan, on bolting up the belly pan to the chassis rails the transmission mount bolts were not protruding through the belly pan they were short by 10mm. At first we thought that we had left a socket or something on the belly pan and the mount was sitting on that, but no not that simple. It was the transfer case that was sitting on the belly pan. The gearbox was an AX15 but from a Cherokee not a Wrangler and for some reason the Cherokee transfer case is clocked differently. So when getting parts from the breakers always double check.

Notice the way the housing are drilled the one on the left is the Wrangler.