I bought a package deal sometime last year (T-5, Bellhousing, Driveshaft and hyd clutch). I just started cleaning up the Drive Shaft and popped the U joints out. I'm a little confused on the installation of new parts. If you take a look at the pics, there is no channel for clips. There is what looks to be a metal ring that might come out close to the center of the race. Can someone clue me in on this one. All of the replacement joints seem to also have clips??

 

Can you enlarge the pics ,bit small to see ?

 

Sure, I just uploaded the attatchments.

 

Sounds like the ones you took out didn't have clips?

Then they were OE. Hopefully you used LOTS of heat to melt that plastic that retained them; if you just pounded or pressed them out without melting that, you probably have a bunch of bent and ruined parts.

But aside from that, you just put the new caps into the ears of the yokes; and when fully assembled, the groove in the caps will be just inside of the inside of the yoke, and that's where the clips go.

 

Thank you Sofakingdom, I appreciate the reply. I used one of those large C clamps made for U-joint and Ball Joint removal. Unfortuneately I did not use the torch to heat things up. The caps did come out without much effort using an impact gun and bench vise. I don't think it bent anything. So just to recap, I need to melt out those inner rings (thought they were steel), press the new joints in and clip the caps on the inside of the yoke. I know sometimes these questions seem simple, but I've never replaced these before. Thanks again for the reply...

 

No need to melt anything any more... that plastic was the factory retention method. There was a groove around the OE caps that matched that, and they injected the plastic in the 2 parts together. Now, to make putting the new ones in easier, just sand the plastic down a bit with some 120 grit or thereabouts.

You have to melt it to avoid using excessive force to disassemble. Doesn't take all that much heat; it can even be done with a propane torch, although it's a bit slow.

But yeah, you just slide the new caps in and put the new clips in the grooves in the caps, just inside of the yoke ears. Just make sure as you put it togehter that you don't accidentally get one of the rollers down in the bottom of the cap outside of the end of the trunnion... you can tell that if it's REAL HARD to get both caps in far enough at the same time to get the clips in. They should pretty much just fall in if it's all put together right.

 

I doubt you've bent anything by popping out the originals without heating them 1st. I've popped lots of originals out cold, and never bent anything. Of course, that was on steel driveshafts. If it's an aluminum shaft. there's a lot more risk of bending something. However, every factory aluminum shaft I've seen actually uses external clips, so once again, no worries.