went to local mudhole and wheeled all day. got pulled twice (not brutal jerks nice and easy). Keep in mind this is my daily driver. I drive home and whole week with no problems. week later I have a VERY bad knock (in drive train can feel it in stick) every time I pull out and a little squeal at 25-35 mph. Now I baby the hell out of my clutch and there is 59000 orig miles on this truck. no major slop in rear drive shaft... i am stumped did i ball my tranny up? rear end? wtf  

I have a 96 tacoma with a ford 9 in rear that is my daily driver too. I had a similar problem is sounds like. I was wheeling all day and drove around for a good week or two with no problems, then i started to get a popping sound in the rear of the vehicle once in a while, only one pop, i could feel it too. Thought nothing of it until it started to happen frequently. Come to find out I had snapped an axle shaft in the rear. I too though it may have been a driveshaft issue or maybe a shock had come loose. I was an axle shaft. Check it out now or you will be making an $800 dollar repair like me. I tore up my loccker an all.  

littleyota:
went to local mudhole and wheeled all day. got pulled twice (not brutal jerks nice and easy). Keep in mind this is my daily driver. I drive home and whole week with no problems. week later I have a VERY bad knock (in drive train can feel it in stick) every time I pull out and a little squeal at 25-35 mph. Now I baby the hell out of my clutch and there is 59000 orig miles on this truck. no major slop in rear drive shaft... i am stumped did i ball my tranny up? rear end? wtf

Is the knock speed/power dependent it that it varies with speed and power level?  

not speed or even power related. it "pops" just once when i pull out. i can slip the clutch all the way out or drop it, it still pops. squeak or squeal sounds like it is comming from the ds rear. i have not had the time to tear into the thing. now correct me if i am wrong but in the past if i had a wheel bearing go if would grind all the time... not squeak. u joint in drive shaft would start to squeak then knock repeatedly (again all the time). if the axle shaft broke i think i would have heard a crack or snap..? the only way i know how to check if it is a axle shaft is to remove the brakes and yank the shafts... i dont have a garage i work on the street. not a good place to find out that I need new shafts...... any other way to find out????? thanks guys  

I would start by pulling rear drive shaft and inspecting it. I suspect a binding slip joint and maybe bad Ujoints too.  

When my shaft snapped, I didn't hear anything because I was focused on wheeling. Thats just me though. I didn't want to believe that I had broken one. The bad thing is though, I waited so long to tear into it and check it out that by the time I did, it had tore up my locker. Is your rear end locked or open? Does your rear end "squat" a little when it pops? To check your shafts you can do it one of a few ways, jack up the rear end and turn your tires, if your rear end is locked the tires should turn the same direction if you have no problems, if it is open they should turn opposite. If there is a problem with in your axles you should be able to tell this way. You can also pull your tires so you can do the same and not have the variable of your tires in there. When mine broke there was still enough of the shaft to make a solid connection so it was harder to detect without pulling the shafts completely. If anyone has any other methods let him know. Good Luck Brother  

open diff. shafts are fine (supertaco thanks for the advice it saved me some wrenching in the road) and thinking back the wheeling i did was in some very soupy mud nothing hung the rear end up real bad and to be honest the 22re turns my 31" real easy anyway. snowman gotta hand it to ya... pumped some grease made pop less noticable. inspected u joints and sure as *** the rear u joint is completly missing the plastic gromlets at the bottom of the caps. that is letting the center of the joint just float in the middle, very sloppy. so ill be pressing thoes out here in a few... i work at advance auto and we cary brute force u joints, guys at work hype them up but i'd rather hear from you being that they dont wheel... any recomendations ????? btw thank you both  

no problem, glad I could be some help. Honestly, I'm not really discrimanatory when it comes to U-Joints. I haven't really had to replace too many. This is my first yota and I haven't had to replace any yet. I am getting ready to here soon and I am going to get with my local off-road shop www.4x4land.com is about an hour away and get what ever they recommend. The owner has had his jeep that he built featured in off road magazine. Thats what I'm going to do. Over the counter parts from local parts stores are good but when it comes to trail breakage, my policy is a few extra dollars spent is a large headache avoided.  

I like Spicer U-joints. Just a few $ more than the Brute force.  

Myself I have found out long ago that if you keep your axles geared properly for tire size and usage you will not have drive shaft issues. Stronger joints are but a bandaid for the real problem and that being average drive shaft torque is too high because of tires size axle ratio combo and it strains joints more and can send the to a early grave. The strongest reduction units in your 4x4 is your axles,(not tranny or Tcase) use them wisely.  

I concur with snoman