Hi everyone,

The other day I unbolted the driveshaft from where it bolts onto the diff, and the part as seen in the attached image fell off as well. I haven't a clue where it came from so don't know if it's important.

I have put everything back together minus this part and the car drives fine.

Any clues please?

 

Toss it in the trash. It is an assembly line aid that ties the two u-joint caps together. This way the caps stay in place as the drive shaft is installed.

RBob.

 

I was gonna guess the same thing, but wasn't sure since there was no reference to size. I think you're right though, that's probably what it is.

 

Are there 2 of them? One on each side of the u joint? If there are then the other one needs to be removed to keep everything in balance. I can't remember if there are 2 or just 1.

 

There's just 1; it goes from one of the cups that goes into the rear end yoke to the other, to keep em from falling off during handling and assembly.

Totally a throw-away part to us out here in meatspace. CRITICAL to the factory, IRRELEVANT DEADWEIGHT once the car has been built.

Out here in the RW, I usually just use masking tape if I need to leave a DS sitting around and don't want to lose the caps.

 

I keep a bunch of those thick rubber bands they use during packing of asparagus to keep the bunches together. These bands work great for keeping the u-joints together.

Only problem with this is I'm forced to eat the asparagus.

 

Oh cool, thanks for the clarification guys.