2023 Rubicon front axle same as 2021 Mojave?

[AaronLawrence]

Hey all, I'm selling a front axle from my 2023 Rubicon to a guy with a 2021 Mojave. He wants to be sure it'll work. Any ideas on how I could look that up?

Sponsored

 

[ShadowsPapa]

Hey all, I'm selling a front axle from my 2023 Rubicon to a guy with a 2021 Mojave. He wants to be sure it'll work. Any ideas on how I could look that up?

Mojave has cast steering knuckles, Rubicon will have aluminum unless it's a diesel.
Will it bolt up? Yeah.

 

[Dmag33]

Mojave has cast steering knuckles, Rubicon will have aluminum unless it's a diesel.
Will it bolt up? Yeah.

My 2020 Gladiator Rubicon with a 3.6 must have that newfangled magnetic aluminum then because mine are cast as per a rare earth magnet and a few file scrapings.

 

[mdyucca]

To offer your buyer some comfort he could look up axle application at aftermarket axle suppliers, such as Dynatrac, and see if they list the same axle for Rubicon and Mojave fitment. As Papa said it should bolt up no problem. The conversion will require a on/off switch for locker activation.

 

[Hootbro]

It will bolt up but I think one caveat is the lower shock mount bracket will be drilled out for the larger Mojave shock eyelet. So something would need to be figured for that either on the shock being put in or the mount having a spacer sleeve to take up the spacing difference.

 

[Dmag33]

My 2020 Gladiator Rubicon with a 3.6 must have that newfangled magnetic aluminum then because mine are cast as per a rare earth magnet and a few file scrapings.

 

[Dmag33]

Mine is a 2020 Rubi purchased used from Carmax with 21,000 on the odo in June of 23, Upon further review, I Think the Knuckles or the Diff/Axle was replaced, maybe with a Mohave unit or aftermarket knuckles. Has/had some strangeness about it which I am researching. According to the window sticker originally had the dual top group but had the premium sunrider soft top only at purchase also had brand new toyo 33's on stock jeep rims but non rubi rims. Spare tire was on a jeep 17" steel rim but several sizes too small, a 245 17 if I remember correctly. Also came with the dealer installed 2" Mopar lift going by the spring, fox shock and link part #'s(they still had the Mopar part tags on 'em). Also has the factory spray in bedliner and can see that it originally had the Trail Rails by the indents in the spray in liner but they were missing when I bought it. Anyway looks like Shadow poppa was correct about the Rubi's having aluminum steer knuckles from the factory as mine are aftermarket I believe. Near as I can figure who ever had it from new maybe leased it, liked it and bought one, or had a buddy who did maybe a sport base model with a soft top as lease was ending and swapped out the tires and rims, kept the hard top and trail rails? Any thoughts?

 

[Hootbro]

Mine is a 2020 Rubi purchased used from Carmax with 21,000 on the odo in June of 23, Upon further review, I Think the Knuckles or the Diff/Axle was replaced, maybe with a Mohave unit or aftermarket knuckles. Has/had some strangeness about it which I am researching. According to the window sticker originally had the dual top group but had the premium sunrider soft top only at purchase also had brand new toyo 33's on stock jeep rims but non rubi rims. Spare tire was on a jeep 17" steel rim but several sizes too small, a 245 17 if I remember correctly. Also came with the dealer installed 2" Mopar lift going by the spring, fox shock and link part #'s(they still had the Mopar part tags on 'em). Also has the factory spray in bedliner and can see that it originally had the Trail Rails by the indents in the spray in liner but they were missing when I bought it. Anyway looks like Shadow poppa was correct about the Rubi's having aluminum steer knuckles from the factory as mine are aftermarket I believe. Near as I can figure who ever had it from new maybe leased it, liked it and bought one, or had a buddy who did maybe a sport base model with a soft top as lease was ending and swapped out the tires and rims, kept the hard top and trail rails? Any thoughts?

I think your experience with the Carmax purchase is probably typical of anybody buying a used Wrangler or Gladiator. There is going to be some weirdness and left-over bread crumbs from the prior owner and their mods and their return to “stock” for when they trade it back in.

When I bought my 2021 WILLYS, I did not initially trade my 2020 Rubicon for it but kept both for a couple of weeks while I transferred most of my mods to from the 2020 Rubicon to the 2021 WILLYS. Since I did not keep a lot of the OEM take off’s from my 2020 Rubicon, I wound up putting most of the take offs from the 2021 WILLYS back on the 2020 Rubicon. This included the WILLYS springs, shocks, tire/wheels and few other things going onto the Rubicon.

When I eventually sold my 2020 Rubicon to Carmax, it looked decent and somewhat “OEM” but any Jeep enthusiast worth their salt would see past it and know it had the WILLYS stuff put on the Rubicon but the Carmax appraiser did not pick up on it and gave me full rate for the trade in.

I would also add, that I had done the full AUX battery delete on my 2020 Rubicon that included removing all the extra aux wiring. It would take some months before my Mopar Owners account would drop the 2020 Rubicon off the account and I was able to see months later that the subsequent owner probably had Carmax paid to have the Aux battery stuff added back in by the dealer service records I saw.

Being long winded with this post, but the point I am trying to make that any newbie new to Jeeps is going to find these variations and missing things buying a used Wrangler or Gladiator as most original owners are going to mod them in some way and when they go for trade in or sale, most are going to be haphazard put back to look stock as that is what most dealers want them as on their used lots to move them.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

That reinforces big time why I won't buy a used JT or JLU from CarMax or Carvana or similar, and would be wary of used on many dealer lots unless I spent an hour or so going over it.

 

[Hootbro]

That reinforces big time why I won't buy a used JT or JLU from CarMax or Carvana or similar, and would be wary of used on many dealer lots unless I spent an hour or so going over it.

About a month ago, I walked my local Carmax lot as they actually had 4 Gladiators on it at one time. Looking over all 4, each one had them had some peculiarity of having been modded at one time. One even had the corrosion bubbles on all four hinges. None of them had feel of just being daily driven stock vehicles.

 

[fade2black]

That reinforces big time why I won't buy a used JT or JLU from CarMax or Carvana or similar, and would be wary of used on many dealer lots unless I spent an hour or so going over it.

I did just this on the '22 Mojave we just bought. It already had 35" Nitto's, Oracle tail lights (ugh), AAL hi-line fender chop LED's, S&B cold air intake, and a few other mods. Because of this I was crawling all around underneath looking for evidence that it was off-roaded hard, but all the skid plates and control arms were clean. After a good hour and a half, I determined it had to be a mall crawler. lol After we purchased it, I found that it also had a Pedal Commander hooked up to it (which was removed by me).

 

[ShadowsPapa]

I did just this on the '22 Mojave we just bought. It already had 35" Nitto's, Oracle tail lights (ugh), AAL hi-line fender chop LED's, S&B cold air intake, and a few other mods. Because of this I was crawling all around underneath looking for evidence that it was off-roaded hard, but all the skid plates and control arms were clean. After a good hour and a half, I determined it had to be a mall crawler. lol After we purchased it, I found that it also had a Pedal Commander hooked up to it (which was removed by me).

Smart- know what you are buying, new or used, but especially used.

Around here, modified Jeeps are a mix. there's little in the line of trails, and our hills and mountains are mostly clay and topsoil. So, you see a lot of Jeeps lifted, bigger tires, and the things are so coated with mud it's hard to tell what color they were, or, they are clean as heck and driven to the grocery store. (maybe they already washed the mud off??)

The dealer i've worked with a few times loves to get our vehicles in - all care history is known, and they know how they were used. But around here - put it back to stock, they don't like taking trade-ins with modifications.

Jeeps are like legos. Buy several sets, mix 'em up, and build something.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

About a month ago, I walked my local Carmax lot as they actually had 4 Gladiators on it at one time. Looking over all 4, each one had them had some peculiarity of having been modded at one time. One even had the corrosion bubbles on all four hinges. None of them had feel of just being daily driven stock vehicles.

Rode hard and put away wet, as they said 150 years ago. (older guys, or those from the western plains will know that one)

Sponsored