Please excuse my ignorance, i have not been able to find the thread that will help me sort this out.  I am in much need of a steel axle housing for my sidekick.  I have broke two aluminum ones at this point and don't want to break another.  I have been searching craigslist high and low in order to find a xl7 or grand vitara with a steel housing.  do both the grand vitara and the xl7 steel axle housing bolt into place on my sidekick? 

Thanks,
Dennis

My steel housings came out of a 1999 Grand Vitara with a manual trans and it bolt rite in with the Sidekick IFS brackets , you will need to make sure you put the correct gears in and take out the GV carrier . I dont know what XL7 has steel housings but I have heard that take differant IFS brackets.

If you go to our home / main page and type in what you're searching for in the upper right hand corner.. you'll get some amazing results!

http://www2.zukiworld.com/?s=steel+sidekick

Good luck, Eric

Thank you gents.

I can confirm that the XL7 steel housing has different mounting brackets.  I learned the hard way after finding one and buying it before seeing it.  I thought about building brackets for it, but I haven't had the time. 

If we can talk Kreator into manufacturing a set of brackets that will bolt an XL7 front differential into a Sidekick, we will have many more steel differentials to choose from.

Are all the XL7's housing the same ? I have an XL7 that I could pull the housing out of for a mock up

I will look for pics and post them again.  I don't think my old post is on the forum any longer.  I bought mine shortly after you beat me to the one you picked up a few years back.

You could always build your steel front diff out of a sami rear diff.  It is not going to break like the aluminum ones.  It didn't take that long convert mine, and now I have modified mine again to make it even better, it would use factory bearings and seals.  I even put a poly bushing in the passengers side improve seal life.

This is what the XL7 steel front differential looks like.

There are two very different XL-7 front differentials - the one pictured above is from an 03~06.

The front diff from an 01~03 XL-7 is very similar to that used on the GV and will interchange provided you use the matching third member "snout" mount with it.

Ya the XL7 that I have is a 02 , I will have to find another 3rd housing as well

I have tried to make a rear mounts that come off the diff housing, extending it back to the cross member, and the forces on it are too much.  I was fortunate in that the mounts I made eventually broke, instead of bolts to the housing.  I ended up welding a duplicate mount to what is on the aluminum housing snout, Now I can use stock rear mounts.
There is a lot of force on that rear mount.

#1. Notice that 4xfourart has more vehicles on their product page than their main page:

Main Page:

http://www.4xfourart.com/English.aspx

Product Page:

http://www.4xfourart.com/EN/163/Product.aspx

Vitara Products:

http://www.4xfourart.com/Products/19/Vitara.aspx

http://www.4xfourart.com/Products/19/Vitara.aspx?Page=2

http://www.4xfourart.com/Products/19/Vitara.aspx?Page=3

VITARA F DIFF HAUSING:

http://www.4xfourart.com/Product/84/VITARA-F-DIFF-HAUSING.aspx

VITARA F IRON HAUSING:

http://www.4xfourart.com/Product/85/VITARA-F-IRON-HAUSING.aspx

#2. Calmini Anvil Front Axle Housing:

http://www.calmini.com/detail.php?b=2&m=5&t=3&p=694&n=

#3. fixing the track/kick front housing BEFORE it breaks...:

http://bbs.zuwharrie.com/content/topic,100689.0.html

#4. Trackick Front Differentials:

http://bbs.zuwharrie.com/content/topic,111661.0.html

You could always build your steel front diff out of a sami rear diff.  It is not going to break like the aluminum ones.  It didn't take that long convert mine, and now I have modified mine again to make it even better, it would use factory bearings and seals.  I even put a poly bushing in the passengers side improve seal life.

Does anyone have any more information on making your own steel front differential? Could you offset it to work like the calmini anvil? 2 of the same length axles?

Use the forum search (or google) to find brd hntr's posts - the conversion is documented in one of his threads - and since you're doing the conversion you get to offset it as you see fit.