especially fun when you have just been there yourself. It brings back a lot of good memories.

 

Well, the trailing arm welded up just fine. I guess I won't be buying new ones right now. I also replaced the brake line that goes across the rear crossmember while I had everything out. I had to do some significant re-bending of the pre-bent tube to get it in there and I'm not too happy with the results. I'll probably work on that a bit more before I am done with all this.

As for the differential, I got the .037" shims back from the machine shop and tried those. I have .040, .037, and .035. Of those, I think the .037 fits the best so I'm going with those. With that decision made, I finished assembling the carrier. Before installing the new 3.36 ring gear, I took some pictures of the factory witness marks. Most of my pictures didn't turn out tonight but I'm posting the better ones. Sorry for the out of focus ones.


I am using ARP bolts to attach the ring gear. This pictures shows an original bolt on the right, the one that came in my kit in the center (with lock washer), and the ARP on the left. The bolt from the kit does not have a shoulder on it and fits looser in the carrier. The ARP bolts fit snuggly into the holes in the carrier. ARP recommends not using a lock washer.


With the ring gear bolted on and torqued down, it was time to press the carrier bearings on. These go on a lot easier than they come off. The next 2 pictures shows the carrier assembled. I used the remains of one of the original carrier bearings to press the new ones on. As Gary has stressed before, the bearing has to go on deeper than the edge of the carrier so you need something the same size as the bearing to press it over that. I think you can see in the second picture that the bearing is lower than the edge of the carrier.

 

looking good so far. Did you take a picture of the coast side pattern? You can see the drive side is center to toe and equal from face to flank,or root to crown as I refer to them. You probably won't get a tech book pattern centered in the drive and coast but you have to get the pattern equal in the face/flank on both sides.

 

Gary -- I didn't see a pattern on the coast side of the ring gear when I took it out of the box so there is no picture.

Here is what I have tried today so far:

pinion shim -- ring gear side shim -- other side shim -- backlash
.031 -- .234 -- .234 -- .003
.031 -- .226 -- .242 -- .007

patterns:



I thought this looked like the pinion gear needed to be deeper (thinner pinion shim).
pinion shim -- ring gear side shim -- other side shim -- backlash
.027 -- .226 -- .242 -- .011

checked the pattern -- still looked like pinion gear needed to be deeper. I didn't take a picture of this pattern and that was a mistake.

pinion shim -- ring gear side shim -- other side shim -- backlash
.024 -- .226 -- .242 -- .013
.024 -- .234 -- .234 -- .008

patterns:



Opinions on that pattern? I'm thinking I might have went a little too thin with the pinion shim.

 

Darren, I just finished installing the diff with new 336's and took it out for a drive to break in the gears. Drove it 25 minutes then let it cool for hour. Drove it again for 30 minutes and put it in the garage. No noise,good feel, just a have an exhaust leak to deal with next year when the warm weather comes back. Used 85-140 oil and GM additive.

 

We must have posted at the same time!
The first one needed a thinner shim and you're close with the second one. You have too much Backlash, I now set new Tom's to .005-.007" Once the coating wears off the new gears the BL will open up .001-.002"
Be sure the carrier(case to be exact) is not too loose in the housing. I go with a snug fit that I just need a little leverage with to get out.
There is usually about a .005" difference between the 2 side bearing shims. I would go back over this again and use a leather belt to create drag while taking a pattern. Keep in mind too that going from a setup bearing to the press on bearing may cause a slight change. I'll post the final pattern from the 336's I just installed.

 

Here are the final patterns I ended up with. .005-.006 BL Usually the coast is more to the toe but this set was different.

 

OK -- backlash is now .005" and I used a belt for resistance. I think its looking better. The carrier is definitely in there snug. Is that good or should I still try a slightly thicker pinion shim?

 

Looks like you're getting closer. the pattern looks to be to the top slightly so yes I would try a .002-.003" thicker shim. Is this still with the setup bearing? Also try a little oil in the paste to loosen it just a little. How does it sounds while rotating the assembly?

 

Here it is with an .027" pinion shim (.003" larger than last time) and .006" backlash. This is all still with the setup bearing. There is some oil mixed in with the grease this time. I have 1 shim in between these 2 -- I think it is about .026".

 

Still looks longer in the root but close. I would go with the new bearing and .026 shim and fine tune it there. You have the bearing splitter if you need to remove the shim again. You're close so you'll want to see where the new bearing is going to setup, shouldn't be off by much.

 

To my untrained eye, I'd say this is pretty darn close. It is with the .026" shim, new bearing, and .005" of backlash. What do you think Gary?

 

Looks good. The drive side is equal from the flank to face, from Toe to center. The coast looks to be equal as well from heel to center. You have been on both sides of the .026" shim and this looks to be the best fit. Did you have to remove the new bearing or was this it the first time?
Now you have to find 2 .005 shims in your kit to add to each side. Before that get the pinion all set, you're going to have to crush the sleeve to get the 15-18 in/lbs range, then install the bearings, and seal, use the #2 on the yoke ID and check the OD to see if you need a speedy sleeve. Loctite the new nut on too. Then install the .005 shims and do a last pattern check to be sure it's still where you have it now.
Install the yoke brg's and seals, add the 85-140 oil and additive, cover gasket and you're ready to go. Remember to break in the new gears by drivng about 20 minutes/15 miles then stop to let it cool for an hour. Do this 2-4 times and change the oil at 500 miles.

Nice Job!!

 

You make it all sound so easy...... I did not have to remove the bearing once pressed on. Also, the new bearing is noticably smoother than the old one.

As for the crush sleeve -- I'm a little concerned about that from everything I have read. My plan is to start the crush with my press. Any advice there?

 

You're doing great, now how many other out there are going to try it? Use good parts if you do.

The crush sleeves in the kits( ratech) are not as hard to crush as the GM sleeves are. The GM sleeves are discontinued from what I was told last week. I used the last one I had on a diff shipped to CA last week. The one you have will require a little help to get going.
Use your old pinion and bearings for this extra push. Place the pinion and lrg bearing on the press, slide the new sleeve in place and install the old sm brg. Press on the inner race to compress the sleeve, just like the yoke will do in the diff. Once it starts to compress, stop and measure it against the old sleeve. Press until it is about .020 over the old sleeve. At this time it should compress to the desired range in the diff with a impact gun. Do this before installing the new seal. Once you are close to the 15-18 in/lbs range then install the seal and finish the install and set to the 15-18.

 

Come on... no takers? What's the worst that can happen? You get in over your head and box everything up and send it to Gary.

Its been a productive evening but the batteries in my camera gave up the ghost tonight so I don't have any pictures.

The crush sleeve was a pain. The one in my kit looked like it was already started. It looked like my old one but slightly taller. I put it in and put my impact wrench on the nut (was using the old nut at this point). My impact wrench couldn't make it budge. Despite the fact that it says it can put out 350 ft-lbs of torque, I don't think it is putting out nearly that much. Anyway, I ended up building a couple of long arms -- one to hold the yoke, the other to turn the nut, and finally got it. I'll try to get a picture of my "tools" tomorrow. Don't underestimate the strength of PVC. They were about 4 to 5 feet long.

Once I got the crush sleeve crushed, I took the old nut off and installed the seal. Before tearing this differential apart, the front seal leaked. The yoke looked a little rough so I went ahead and put the sleeve on it. I put Permatex 2B on the teeth of the yoke and greased the seal before putting the yoke on. I used loc-tite on the new nut and torqued it down until I could measure a drag of about 17 in-lbs. I pretty much went from under 5 to over 15 with a small turn of the nut.

I added .005" shims to each side of the carrier and pounded those in with a piece of brass and hammer. I used my new cap screws and torqued down the bearing caps and measured the backlash. Backlash was 0.006" -- slightly more than it was before but still good. I put grease on the gears and took a pattern and I think it looks the same as before.

After that, I installed the side bearings and seals and slipped in the new side yokes. I can't feel any endplay in the side yokes but I didn't measure it. I'll measure it tomorrow and see if I need to grind them down to get some endplay.

 

sounds great, set the side yoke play to .005-.010"

 

ttt

 

I got some new batteries for my camera so here are a few pics. The first 2 are of the tools I used to crush the crush sleeve. I did this using the old nut. I bolted the long angle iron to the yoke and used the PVC pipe as a cheeter bar over my breaker bar on the nut (not the little breaker bar in the background but a bigger one). As you can see, these are 5 feet long. You can also see that the angle iron is mangled on one end and the PVC pipe shows no signs of stress. The grade 8 bolts that were securing the angle iron are bent as well. I used the PVC because I had it -- its actually my fishing pole holder for when I go to the coast for surf fishing.



This is a picture of my driveshaft all cleaned up and new u-joints installed. If you haven't already, you should take a look at this u-joint thread -- http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1548292. The only tricky thing here is that the Spicer's have plastic rings at the base of the caps that snap into place when the cap is pressed all the way on. Once on, it is difficult to get them off without breaking them. I bought a complete set of u-joints for the driveshaft and half shafts from one place and every u-joint had all of the caps pressed all the way on already. I broke 2 of the rings trying to get them off. I bought the replacements from another place and the u-joints from that place did not have the caps pushed on. I would recommend looking at the u-joints when you buy them and make sure the caps are not yet pressed on.

 

Darren, ....nice work as usual.....
Did you encounter any problems getting the spicer U-joint caps pressed into the yokes?

I read Garys thread and says the cap radius is too large...

Quote:
"This wouldn't be a corvette job without a mod of some sort. These 1/2 shafts were virgin after leaving the factory, I was the only one to work on them. The Spicers are bigger and will not fit into the flange or yokes unless you fit them by grinding a radius in the yoke."

Just wondering if you had to also radius your yokes...

-Mike