How hard is this to do on your own? This has always been a bit taboo for me, I've heard you can setup your gears and think they're ok, and tear them up when they're on the road, but I was watching a 4x4 show the other day, and they made it sound fairly easy. They showed where you can swap shims to adjust your backlash, and they basically measured the backlash to tell if it was done right.

Is that really all there is to it?

How hard is it really to change your own gears and what tools do you need? Dial indicator?

Mathius

 

you have to setup the pinion depth as well as the backlash. and press the bearing on and off.

 

it's really easy to do with the proper tools. you'd need a way to measure pinion depth, a press, bearing seperator or a good puller set, dial type in/lb torqie wrench, indicator and base, and a special tool to hold the yoke.

 

Hmm. They did it with the rear end still in the vehicle, so I'm guessing that's why they didn't need a fixture for the yolk. They hammered the pinion out with a brass hammer, used a press to remove the bearing, and hammered the new bearing on using some kind of pipe as a sleeve to hold it centered. It didn't seem like just scrap pipe lying around, it had a lip on it, so I'm guessing it was made for that (whether they made it, or it was an actual tool).

They didn't say a word about measuring pinion depth. Do you do that before or after putting the carrier in?

What's an "indicator and base" ?

Thanks guys. Is this something that you'd need to have someone showing you, or will a good book be enough to keep you safe?

Mathius

 

indicator and base - aka dial indicator. A dial indicator can't just hang in mid air, so it'll need a base.

Check mcmaster carr, they have a "budget" dial indicator and base that's around $30. We picked one up at work a while ago, good setup there.

They either were using some weirdo Ford rear end or something where you don't need the tool, or they cleverly skipped a hard part, to make it sound like an easy job. But anyway, you need this tool no matter what, if you're doing it on a 7.5" GM 10 bolt at least. It's simple, I used a 4' piece of 1" angle iron. I just measured the distance between the bolt holes in the yoke, and drilled the holes in the angle iron that distance. Than used the yoke strap bolts to hold the tool on. That holds the yoke still while you reef on the pinion nut.

A book, with a few pictures is enough. I don't even think I had a book on this, just chilton, and glanced at a few pictures on superchevy.com or whoever did one of these gear swaps and had the story with pictures on their site. It's pretty straightforward actually.

 

Thanks. I'm pretty sure a chilton or haynes won't work anymore though. Anymore, anything they consider more technical like this, they put some blurb about how you should have it done by a certified technician or some crap.

Great books eh?

'Course I could be wrong about this particular piece of tech, but I've seen that message more than once.

Mathius

 

IF you do decide to tackle the job, you dont need to waste time making a thing to hold the yoke, just strap a monkey wrench on it and put a pipe over the handle and let it stop against the LCA or body.

You wont need a press. Just freeze the pinion for a night and heat the bearing in the oven to 350 deg, it drops right on. Just have a pipe the correct diameter incase you need to tap it the last 1/2 inch. I did this for carrier bearings and pinion bearing.

Bearing separator/puller from Harbor freight is 30$, it will take the bearing off the pinion (incase you are reusing the stock shim to start with).

Dont reuse races with new bearings. Youll have to beat the crap out of the races to remove them most likely.

Dial indicator and mag base from Harbor freight was purchased onsale for a total of 13.99! for both.

 

How do you go about measuring pinion depth? Do you measure from the flat part of the dif (where the gasket goes) to the tip of the pinion, or what?

Oh, and if you go 9", the whole third member gets replaced, right? No measuring?

Mathius