Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffahart
Ha Ha, that's classic.. typical scenario in my axle search too. Hopefully your current setup will keep you on(or off the road) for a while.
Re the crossover. Man, my truck drives so sweet with my setup. I can take my hands off the wheel on the freeway at 60 and it tracks straight, over bumps and everything. It's never driven so good. My advise, if you ain't hard core wheeling and your vehicle tracks good... don't jack it up. I feel like I got lucky on my current setup. Maybe not luck, but my expectations have been surpassed by the way this truck handles! And it could probably even use a king pin knuckle spring and bushing replacement. But I don't think I could get it to handle any better, maybe HD springs up front. I used to gripe about the 4" Skyjacker soft rides up front being too mushy. Now that is not a pet peeve anymore because it just hugs the road.
Anyhow, you know the old saying... if it works don't fix it.
As always my 2cents... worth the price paid!  |
Interesting on the crossover steering Jeff. I've never really noticed any bump steer but then again, I probably wasnt paying attention. Im for sure not going to do it to this 44 but am actively keeping an eye out for a 60 now. I figure I can sell the nearly completely refurbished 44 to help offset the cost but for now, Ill just rock the little axle.
A little progress made this week.
I pulled the pinion out and noticed that the bearings looked great as did the cups.
I got the passenger side carrier bearing off with the bearing splitter that I bought for the NV4500. It came off pretty easy. Seems like there is not alot of press on those.
I should probably watch a video on using the splitter so I don't have to blow apart bearings with a chisel in the future.
After putting a little grease on the pinion bearings, it went back in with a new seal. I was very mindful of the shim positions in the process. There were a lot of them and some were paper thin!
I reinstalled the shims on the carrier in their original places and pressed on the new carrier bearings all the while praying that Timken hadn't changed their tolerances in 40 years
. Fingers crossed!
I put the carrier back into the housing - which was a tighter fit than coming out. I attributed this to wear on the bearings and cups? Anyway, a little persuasion with a pry bar and it went in snug. 60# on the caps. 160# on the pinion.
I turned the yoke on the assembly and it did have a little drag. By the seat of my pants Id say 5 to 15Lbs. Light drag. Nothing weird. Backlash at the yoke was how I remember it (sounding pretty scientific now huh?).
The Yukon bearing kit came with a tube of grease paint so I used it to check the wear pattern. Looks to be a little more towards the toe and centered in the tooth. From what Ive read, this is good for new gears and bearings? Ill get a pic up later on this.