if they are FJ80 axles dont bother we found a deal on some to put under my Sammy. Until we realized the two axles sacked out a 08' Taco. When we tried picking u each axle, my jetski felt a shit load lighter two guys can pick that up to your waist and that weights 351lbs dry. it took all we could to get the axles barely off the ground. my guess at minimum was 425-450lbs for the rear and 450-475 if not more for the front axle.

I guess being early 70's and both equipped with drum brakes im told they are 40 series.

You will sink allot of coin into them if there drum braked(disc conv) and rebuild. If your not going over a 35 inch tire you might
Just want to do the pickup axle route.I had 5 fj-60's at one time and beat the hell out of them with 33" boggers without a single failure.I loved 'em. My .02

well maybe I will just buy them and clean them up with some grinding and fresh paint and see if I can trade for some nice pickup axles then.

I would. besides it would be a good set to learn from with out having your DD down.

Bigger and heavier is not always better.  It takes more power to turn the heavier axles, and even more power to turn Larger tires.  One of the reasons Sami's go so many places is they are light rigs and can crawl over terrain that the larger heavier rigs sink on and have more power to pull through.  If an increase in power is not planned as well (or in the budget) I would say just buy heavy duty axles, and keep it light.
Learn to use finesse, not brute strength, cause in the end that is going to get you further.

If you have some fab skills its not hard but the axles are a lot heavier , I have put a couple sets in and it just takes some custom fab work with the one spring perch fabbed wright on  the side of the diff housing .both work well and some times money is an issue, I'll try and get you pics of one .

I think that you should be going with it. I am sure that you will like it and there will no change in the performance of the vehicle with this modification.

if they are FJ80 axles dont bother we found a deal on some to put under my Sammy. Until we realized the two axles sacked out a 08' Taco. When we tried picking u each axle, my jetski felt a shit load lighter two guys can pick that up to your waist and that weights 351lbs dry. it took all we could to get the axles barely off the ground. my guess at minimum was 425-450lbs for the rear and 450-475 if not more for the front axle.

  They weren't THAT heavy... I LOVED mine under my Sidekick... FJ80's with full floating and factory elockers... not to mention 4 wheel disc... hard to beat.

Plus... we brought them home in a cheap little red harbor freight/fred meyer 4x8 trailer.



Sure you're talking about FJ80's?

I'd do it again in a heartbeat to my GV I just picked up. Gotta wait a while though. Not sure I'm going to go that extreme with this one.