my dad tried working on my rear recently, just to make sure it was in decent shape, and he told me he couldnt take it apart. a couple of things i want to go over that he told me.

1) "it doesnt have c-clips, it has a pin in the middle of the rear holding the axles together"

2) "i cant get the pin out, usually you just put a magnet in there, and it comes right out after you take out the alen key holding it in, then you can remove the axles and work on the rear"

how is it possible for my car not to have c-clips??? does that mean its not the stock rear? i thought all of these cars came w/ c-clip rear ends. also, does what he said make sense to you guys? have any of you heard that happening? or has it happened to you?

by the way, i have a 1989 firebird formula (had a stock 305 TPI)

 

if it is a ten bolt. then you have to remove the small bolt in the side of the diff chunk so you can remove the big pin, then you have to push your axles in to get at the c clips.

 

There is always the buns o' steel workout.....

Sorry, it's late and I'm gettin' a little punchy....

 

LOL... dude thats hilarious.

but seriously, are the c-clips very apparent on the rear? like are they very obvious? if so, can you see them if you just lift the car and look at it?

 

remove the center pin, then push in the axles to reveal the C-clips. unless your car has a 9 bolt borg-warner rear end then it will have no C-clips and the axles bolt in like a ford 9" design. counting the bolts on the cover will clear it up for you.

 

thats the thing, he said he cant remove the center pin. its like jammed in there, he said from doing too many burnouts, heating it up and stuff over the years.... it has over 245,000 miles on it if its the original rear end....

waht do you think?

 

I think that IF the locking pin came out in one piece, the center pin should slide right out. I went through this awhile ago myself - when I still had my 10 bolt rear in it.

My problem was that the pin broke and the last 1/2" or so was stuck in there. Kinda sounds like what you're descibing.

It all starts and ends with the lock pin. If it doesn't come out, there's no way to take anything apart -axles included.

I'll see if I can find the post, and paste it up here. Skyway tools sells an extraction kit just for this common problem. And there's magnets, etc...

 

OK - here it is. It started out with a vibration problem, so it's a long post. Look halfway down page 2 and you'll see the pin I'm talking about.

https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...n&pagenumber=2

 

Hye, thanks SO much man!

 

I just finished rebuilding my 10 bolt, and had a fair bit of trouble. My cross shaft also needed a fair bit of nudging. I turned it so the side that has the hole in it, was pointing away from me. Then I hammered the pin into the center section, about 1" or so, just enough that I can still rotate it back. Then once I could get to the hole that the 5/16" pin was in, I just pried it out with that.

I sure hope you used a 6 point box end wrench for that bolt, and heat, there's red loctite from the factory.

Here are the 3 threads I made whilst disassembling my rear end, hope they help.

1
2
3

 

most definetly, thanks everyone for all the help once again