When the gears were changed in my car, the stock output shaft was replaced with a hardened piece. From some external inspection, it looks like the shaft is broken, has anybody ever seen the hardened shafts break?

 

WHAT DOES " From some external inspection, it looks like the shaft is broken, has anybody ever seen the hardened shafts break? "MEAN??? What are you seeing that indicates shaft breakage??

What are your symptoms?

Its possible to break anything if the right conditions exist. What were you and the car doing at the time of te issue??

Thanks

Bill

 

You posted earlier regarding your problems and it sounded like you had narrowed things down to the differential. Are you still at the differential or moved forward to the transmission now? What did you find or rather, what and where did you find whatever?

 

Bill, this is a description from a previous post of mine,

"Ok, I jacked the rear of the car up and spun the wheels. the right wheel has some resistance, but the left wheel just kind of spins freely. With the car in gear and the engine at idle. the right wheel spins and the left wheel is still. When you give the engine some gas, the right wheel will spin then lock and just keep doing that. if you look at the left side axle when the car is in gear, it slightly moves in and out of the diff so I'm guessing the splines are gone."

The car has just been sitting since last weekend, so I haven't gone any farther yet. Hopefully this weekend I can get the diff out. I was just wondering if anybody has seen the hardened shafts break before. Im only putting around 400 rwhp down.

 

BTW at the time of carnage, I wasn't driving really hard. Just about half throttle in 2nd gear.

 

That is the same thing everyone says when something breaks....

 

If the output shaft from the transmission broke, when you had the rear end off the ground with the engine running and in-gear, neither of the rear wheels would move. Having said that, there is an un-countable number of possible combinations that the shaft could be broken or partially broken/shattered and the wheels would still move...but both of them. But with only one wheel moving my money is on the differential. I have the main shaft from my original transmission that was replaced. I don't know if its the same as the output shaft or not, but its one seriously strong chunk of metal. Of course, anything can be broken given enough force as Bill mentioned. There are the two output shafts from the differential too and I think they have CV type joints on them. You might get lucky having lost one of those only...hope and pray thats all it is.

 

If you have the car in the air, engine off and hold the right side tire you shouldn't be able to turn the left side tire. If this is true and then your reverse that would indicate that it is isolated to the left side. Either output shaft or possibly the half shaft should be examined next.

 

If you have hardened shafts on your differential, then you probably broke something inside the differential. You could drain the fluid first and see if any metal comes out. You make have broke something inside the posi unit. Like a spider gear. Be prepared for a complete rebuild if thats the case.

 

It sounds like the clutch packs are gone to me. If they get really worn down the output shaft will get alot of play in them and spin then hook like you described. I would bet the preolad spring in it is completely destroyed. If you drain the oil it will be blatantly obvious if you have major problems or not.