Rebuild the 208 or swap for a 205?

[TRAILTOYZ]

Well, the NP208 in my burb's leaking like a sieve and I either need to rebuild the thing or swap in a rebuilt 205. I want to clock it at the same time and build a flat belly skid, but is there a clocking adapter out for the 208/TH400? Would a 205 bolt up to my TH400 in place of the 208 or is a different adapter needed? Whaddya think, and is there anything you can do to beef up the 208 or is it just not worth it?

 

[NorthWestFab]

As far as the NP208 goes, there really isnt any upgrades availible, you can rebuild it and get a good quality chain in there. The key downside ot the NP208 is always going to be the case itself. They are prone to cracking when put through significant abuse. I have seen them crack due to internal stress, not always an impact.

That said, the rebuild kits and chain arn't going to set uo back a hell of a lot, and the case can easily be clocked. It's going to be significantly cheaper to rebuild the NP208 than swap in a NP205. With that said, some would call that polishing a turd. You'll need to look into how you use your vehicle and what your plans are for the future, if the NP208 is going to suit your needs.

The NP205 is fairly plain and simple animal, the chances of you breaking a rebuilt 205 is slim to nil. You'll lose a bit of low range, have to get an adaptor and mess about with driveshafts. If you never want to go dual cases in the future, you would be able to retain the same TH400 version NP205. It's also going to be a bit heavier, but that comes with strength.

The pro's and cons need to be weighed, if you could give us some insight on the future of this vehicle and drivetrain we might be able to better suggest the avenue for you to go.

-Kyle.

 

[Hossbaby50]

The TH400 that is in front of a 208 is different then a TH400 infront of a 205 so I believe you would need to swap your current TH400 and 208 out for a TH400/205 setup. If you aren't abusing the 208 offroad very heavily then I would say clock it, rebuild it, and skidplate it.

I have put some heavy use on my truck with 208's and have had few case related problems that were the actual fault of the case. I had to replace my planetary gears once, and I had to do a freshining up of a couple bearings once. For a case with 160K on it that isn't bad in my opinion especially since I rockcrawled my truck for 2 years on some pretty decent trails in AZ. I did destroy a 208 once but that was my fault not the cases. If the case wouldn't have been aluminum and cracked then I would have cracked the transmission or tranny adapter.

Harley

 

[atho]

Unless you have a 32 spline 205 just laying around, rebuild the 208. the 32 spline 205's are getting harder to find, not to mention big $$$$$$$.