This thread is where I will post updates of my modifications, issues i've had, and potential upgrades I'm considering.  

 

This page is dedicated to @TFaoro, because without him my truck would be bone stock still....

 

To start off, today my VP died.  It took me by surprise, as it gave no indication there was an issue.  But, it threw Death Code P1691, and that's that.  Good thing it died before I bought tires.

 

Is DAP everyone's first choice for a new VP?

 

Edited March 15, 20178 yr by trreed

8 hours ago, trreed said:

Ha.  No.  Got sent the wrong pinion seal, considered leaving the pinion seal and front bearing alone until I found rusty oil on the bearing from where water had been seeping in.  All the parts stores only stock the seal for the flanged yoke, so I gotta go to the dealer for this seal

When I did my pinion seal on my rear end and not because it was leaking from wearing out, it's rusted through on the bottom double shielded metal piece. I got it from Loco Sadler Power Train, they stock Spicer stuff.

It lives!  Pattern came out great.  Differential is dead quiet.  No howling, chirping when turning, or other goofy noises. Now for the “break-in”!

On the road again, as Willie would say.

Did you have to adjust both side to side and in and out, being its Factory replacement.

Backlash came out ok without shims. Pinion I was able to reuse the factory shims

Stacked differently or in same order. Guessing different as nothing is identical. I can see thickness of ring gear being same. Ether way you shouldn't had to move it much, I don't think. I know it's time consuming though if you have to do it more than twice lol. One time it took me like 6-7 tries lol but wanted it perfect. 

Stacked in the same order. Fun fact, the rear pinion bearing isn’t shimmed. The damn race is. Yeah I got lucky. Turns out Spicer etches the number of shims needed to set the pinion depth on the pinion. I didn’t know that when I put the factory size stack of shims in. Backlash was 6 thou and pattern was just off square of the center of the tooth

Edited June 21, 20186 yr by trreed

Maybe ya'll can answer this for me. How much free play should you have in the rear end when you rotate the drive shaft my hand. Mine seems to have gotten looser over the years. Have not checked it in a while but it seems that feel it more these days from coasting to applying throttle. No clunk or other noise but you feel it. After 445k it probably would not hurt to have someone open and look it over. I would not know what to look for. 

Mine was around 1/8 turn. Now it’s almost no free play after the rebuild

 

Edited June 21, 20186 yr by trreed

@dripley yeah shouldn't be much, like @trreed said 0.006 is all it is, so with time it will be more, but if use more than one brain cell at a time you should be fine just doing your normal driving. It's the sudden shock is what brakes things. I had a brand new set of gears in a 4rnr with 5.56 on 35" tires and had about 10k on them and then one day playing, clunck and 3 teeth are missing on the ring gear. They were Yukon, new set was redesigned with a better yoke, but still just cut it at the right time. Too much traction or sodden jerk and bye bye 

Hey now that’s my good brain cell you’re **** talking there.   My other two aren’t good for much of anything. 

Edited June 22, 20186 yr by trreed

39 minutes ago, Dieselfuture said:

@dripley yeah shouldn't be much, like @trreed said 0.006 is all it is, so with time it will be more, but if use more than one brain cell at a time you should be fine just doing your normal driving. It's the sudden shock is what brakes things. I had a brand new set of gears in a 4rnr with 5.56 on 35" tires and had about 10k on them and then one day playing, clunck and 3 teeth are missing on the ring gear. They were Yukon, new set was redesigned with a better yoke, but still just cut it at the right time. Too much traction or sodden jerk and bye bye 

 

24 minutes ago, trreed said:

Hey now that’s my good brain cell you’re **** talking there.   My other two aren’t good for much of anything. 

Well 006 of an inch would be barely perceptible rotating the drive shaft. It is only a little more than a brain cell.

 

Mine has had more than that for quite a while.

2 minutes ago, dripley said:

 

Well 006 of an inch would be barely perceptible rotating the drive shaft. It is only a little more than a brain cell.

 

Mine has had more than that for quite a while.

I believe .006 is directly related to pinion to ring gear lash, but then it will have a bit more play through everything else 

0.006 is the amount of backlash the ring gear has when the pinion is held stationary.  It moves more than you think it would.  Rotational play in the pinion is going to be that 0.0xx backlash plus the tolerance of the free-to-rotate pinion teeth.

That's a little bit better explanation. I know how this stuff works but sometimes can put it on the paper. And you're right .006 can feel looser than it is. 

I guess where I was heading with that is, by moving drive shaft back and forth it could seem that you have more play than you actually do. 

 

I figured there was more to it than just the .006. The drivemhas always had more slack than that in it since the first time I ever checked many years ago. But does seem to have more these days than back then.

Getting closer to done!

Don’t rush or anything

Cool, I thought about going with square ones but decided not to, look good.