Nah, duratrac spare and up front. Newer MT/R's on the rear load range E.

matt have you tested them out in the snow or icy conditions? im looking for a tire thats quiet since i would mainly travel highways with the zj but would also be very good in the snow, and also at a decent price.

I had some duratrac's on my last jeep, great tire, did good in everything except for heavy mud. My buddy has the AT2's and they do great as well, also had bfg all terrains on my last xj no complaints.

I have not had them in snow, just got em on the truck a few months ago. They did fine in mud/sand though.

BFG A/Ts are excellent in the snow, but the Duratracs are probably cheaper. I'd check that rear noise; not going to be good if you have carrier bearings go boom when you're miles from home. May even be a problem with the driveshaft, perhaps something as simple as a new U joint. Any vibrations? As for the electrical, it could be something as simple as needing a new battery.

My mtr's were fine through this messy stuff. When I was going 40+, I clicked it into 4wd and felt very stable with the duratracs up front. Didn't think twice about driving, braking, or turning. The only thing was I noticed the tires do like to float some but they are very wide. in4moarsnow

yeah ill look into tires when i get to that bridge. ill get the jeep working great first. as of now i took it out in the snow and its a monster even with crappy tires...i think there are different tires mounted on each wheel lol..frankenjeep. i got the title and everything figured out today..they didnt give me an issue at the dmv.

i plan to check out that noise from the rear sound soon. it sounds like something swirling its hard to explain. what would the worst case scenario be...if its the carrier bearings how much would that cost if i brought it to a shop? the electrical problem i solved the other day. it looks like someone took the original wire that connected to the battery, attached a thinner wire to that wire to connect to the battery. the thinner wire was the one that was melted and frayed with copper exposed. i looked down as far as i could with the original wire and it appeared to be in good condition. so i ripped the thinner wire off and got a new terminal cable and it hooked up just fine. no issues as of yet with it...it fires up much better than before.

i also replaced the plugs and wires and holy crap there was so much carbon build up on the old ones i wouldnt be surprised if the previous owner hadnt changed them in 100k miles. but i could really feel a difference with newer plugs.

the noise in the rear could even be something dumb like a brake part rubbing. idk ill have to check it out whenever i get a chance.

Yeah I'd start simple first and pull the rear tires off and see what's going on there.

I'll do that when I get a chance this weekend. she told me her mechanic said the ball joints might be going but who knows. are there any other symptoms of these carrier pins going besides a noise coming from the rear?

As stated above, jack up the rear and see if you can duplicate the noise (Or any noise) by spinning the tires. It could indeed just be a friction issue. Does it have rear disc brakes? I know my '01 does. Maybe it's as simple as that. Another trick would be to remove the rear drive shaft, put it in 4WD and drive a short distance to see if the noise went away. If it does, then the driveshaft may need a new U joint. Easy fix. Worst case scenario would be bad bearings, or something within the rear diff. If that's the case, you could end up spending anywhere between $500 and $1500. Differentials are very labor intensive and require specialized tools to do correctly.

i didnt get a chance to mess around with the sound coming from the rear yet. it does have disc brakes all around. im hoping its just a bad rotor or something its really weird if i turn hard sometimes the sound lessens. i just need to borrow a jack from a buddy of mine and ill be able to jack it up.

as for other stuff, i decided to do a few minor things to get things in order for the winter, and i got around to flushing the coolant out. and man, there has to be some major rust issues going on somewhere, when i drained the coolant from the valve on the lower part of the radiator it looked like apple cider was pouring out. definitely not good, wherever the rust is it could rust through any day now.

i have a new issue also. when i turned the jeep off and went around to open up the rear gate when i was done for the day the tail lights and third brake light wouldnt go off. tried messing with the light switches and everything and nothing was getting them to go off. i finally disconnected the battery and that got them to go off. according to jeep forum its a common electrical problem..any jeep owners here have that happen to them?

I would look at the brake light switch under the dash. It is tripped by the brake pedal. I would also suspect a bad multifunction switch aka turn signal switch.

idk what i did but i connected the battery today..lights were still on. then i looked under the dash for that switch you were talking about by the brake pedal. just saw a bunch of wires and looked confusing. touched a few of them and walking back around the truck...i noticed they were off. lmao. must be a loose wire.