This is the pattern that I have. For some funky reason the rear housing that I have needed a .017 pinion shim, this is no where near what the factory had. Anyway after calling richmond this is what I came up with. This is the fourth time I have had this apart and I would like a second opinion before I drive it. Any Ideas.

BTW: the coast side is centered and towards the toe and I have .008 backlash.

 

.017"??? Thats awfully thin. Are you sure your rear pinion bearing (the big one) race is fully seated? .029" was the thinnest I ever had to use, and that was at the GM Training Center. All the ones I have done in the "field" were .034"+

 

I know, I thought of that too. I am puzzled by this one, all common sense tells me that I am missing something. But I double checked everything, twice, and this is the drive pattern that I got. Is this a driveable pattern?

 

The pinion depth looks good, Ive had to use .015-.017 on some setups with aftermarket gears so its not uncommon, just make sure the race/bearings are seated. You do need to re-shim the carrier a bit hard to say exactly how much, Id remove .005 from the right side and add it to the left but that is very close as is.

 

If you move .005 from the right side, and put it on the left side, that will put your backlash from .0080" to .0055" Thats a little to tight. If you can, post a pic of of the coast side. The drive side seems to be biased to the "face" of the gear (above the pitch line).

Did you load the ring gear down while you turned the pinion? You have to "load" it to get an accurate reading. That might explain why the pattern is above the pitch line. If you take a large screwdriver and pry between the case and the ring gear to cause drag on the ring gear, then turn the pinion. You'll probably get better readings.

P.S. How did you establish proper preload on the side carrier bearings? Insufficient preload will cause the ring gear to move under load and skew the readings as well.

 

I did apply load with a screwdriver during the marking, I would say medium pressure. I set the side preload by getting the proper backlash then adding shims equally until I just barely could get them in with my hands then I added .005 to each side then rechecked backlash. Here is the coast side. I appreciate this help greatly.