Dana 60 Axle Shaft Installation

[special-K]

Nothing to it, right? Why start a thread about it? Well, has anybody ever had it be not so easy? I can't tell you how many axle shafts I have slid in and out of housings without a thought. If I did tell, you might think I was talking about the days when free love was the thing .

So, they go in to pretty close, then you need to raise it into the case, then at about 2" line up the splines, and slide it home. Well, I got the spline engaged and it slides to about 3/4" out and bottoms out. Never have I had this happen. What a PIA. Has this happened to anyone else? I guess the side gear has slipped down? Is this not so uncommon? Or is there something else to this? I'm about to go out to drain, pull cover, and inspect... unless I get some sort of other tip before too long.

I'm no mechanic, but I've been working on these trucks for 45 years. This is something I have never run across or heard about.

[Ol Blue K20]

Have you tried moving the shaft up/down and side to side while pushing?

[Bigdav160]

Powerlok? I wonder if the hub and side gear are no longer matched up? Of course if it's in good shape that shouldn't happen

[special-K]

Originally Posted by Ol Blue K20

Have you tried moving the shaft up/down and side to side while pushing?

Yeah, everything. The splines are engaged, just stops before it gets there. I tried rotating tooth to tooth and tried the other shaft.

Originally Posted by Bigdav160

Powerlok? I wonder if the hub and side gear are no longer matched up? Of course if it's in good shape that shouldn't happen

Yes, Powerlok and that's what I'm fearing. More to it. Guess it's time to find out.

[Ol Blue K20]

Is it doing it on both sides? I guess you need to pull the cover and look at it. I'm curious to see what's causing it.

[special-K]

The other side went together fine. It's opened up and ready to pull... once I pull the other axle back out. We'ii see

[Ol Blue K20]

Any updates?

[special-K]

Stalled a bit. I had the carrier starting to come out, but got tough at one point. I'm tired of laying up under a truck in the driveway to do stuff like this. Nowhere to use my big pry bars, or get good leverage, and just uncomfortable. I have new axle seals, bearings, and brakes. Now I'm pulling the pumpkin. Probably the side bearing is crap. Just a guess, but only thing I can imagine is bearing dropped in the race... bad bearing. The pinion seal has been seeping forever. So my buddy is hauling it up to his shop with lift tomorrow. Either fix on lift or pull and put on horses. The rear will be right eventually. Going to look hard at that PowerLok, too. Might be time for something new.

[Ol Blue K20]

Originally Posted by special-K

Stalled a bit. I had the carrier starting to come out, but got tough at one point. I'm tired of laying up under a truck in the driveway to do stuff like this. Nowhere to use my big pry bars, or get good leverage, and just uncomfortable. I have new axle seals, bearings, and brakes. Now I'm pulling the pumpkin. Probably the side bearing is crap. Just a guess, but only thing I can imagine is bearing dropped in the race... bad bearing. The pinion seal has been seeping forever. So my buddy is hauling it up to his shop with lift tomorrow. Either fix on lift or pull and put on horses. The rear will be right eventually. Going to look hard at that PowerLok, too. Might be time for something new.

That sucks but at least it'll be right and not leave ya on the side of the road.

[Bigdav160]

Dana 60's can be tough without a case spreader

[Ol Blue K20]

I agree. .... probably why it's going to a shop.

[special-K]

Yeah, I thought about getting my hands on a case spreader, but mainly I don't want to get into gutting and rebuilding the thing laying up under it on a stone driveway.

It does suck how my steps kept going backwards from what started (I thought) as a rear wheel cylinder/shoes job. But the silver lining will be a freshened up rear. My main concern with the old axles is keep them from further damage. You never know when that parts no longer available day will come. When a bearing goes it can be very bad for other parts. I just wish this was all happening last winter and it was good to go for the summer.

Now my friend's Duramax 'puter is giving him hell. He was going to pick it up day before yesterday. He is as good as they get with automotive electronics. He can go inside and alter programs, etc. He puts a new unit in and now the truck cranks as soon as the key goes in the ignition. I'd rather have my problems

[special-K]

I never followed up on this. Mainly because it just got straightened out last Saturday. My friend has been busy as a billy goat with two peckers this summer and so was I until lately. He came down and we messed with it in the driveway. He checked it out and came up with same thing, gotta come out. He's not only younger (never complained about neck or other pains) but he's an ace. He asked for a screwdriver while under there. Nothing specific, just a straight screw driver. I hand him one and next thing I know he has the carrier out in his hands. How he do dat??

The only thing we could see is there was a lot of hard old crud caked in there. I guess the P.O. didn't change fluid ever. I've had the cover off a few times and changed fluid, using Royal Purple. Maybe that loosened up the crud. Lots of cleaner sprayed in there and lots of picking that crud out. The shaft still didn't find home. More picking out crud and Brakleen. We set it up using a step ladder and inserted the shafts. After some trying it slid home. Very carefully he rotated it around to the way it goes in, installed, and both shafts slid home. I'm happy, truck operates well, and I have parts for later on for when I go through the drivetrain. I've never seen a thing like this before and neither has he.

[special-K]

I'm curious and would like to hear from anyone who has or any comments you mechanics have after all you have seen. Has anyone else seen a differential so cruddied up or had it prevent assembly? I mean if you tapped the axle flange with a hammer it would ring like it was solid metal to metal. Before I tore into it everything was working fine. The posi operated as it was designed and all that. I know because or the way I became fully aware I had no rear brakes.

This had me freaked out for a while. It was like nothing I had ever experience in driving before:

It had just dumped rain during a thunderstorm while I was in Walmart, the roads still wet with water laying in low spots. I make a right from a stop sign, light on the throttle, it shifts to second and the rear end is coming around I guess the road was greasy. Wasn't going very fast yet, I turned into it, but didn't square up, just kept sliding diagonally toward the other side of the road where it dropped off 3' or so into an untilled crop field. There was a sign post in my path so I used the brakes which seemed to do make it worse. I figure the rear wheels were still spinning away. Remember, this is a posi so that's both wheels and still trying to come around since the front brakes were binding. At this point it was slide into the road sign broadside or head the truck straight into the field over the drop-off. I feared I'd roll it if I hit it sideways, especially sliding. I romped over the drop-off into the field heading toward the treeline at a slight incline. Brakes where about useless on the muddy soil with only front brakes. The incline was the biggest help. So now I'm sitting at the edge of the field facing uphill and it hit me, my lockouts (Selectro) were not functioning due to needing an obsolete part I've been searching for. I back it in a j-turn to get it parallel to the top of the field facing the road to traverse my way over. Of course, the posi was taking the rear sideways but I crabbed it to the road throwing dual rooster tails of mud. I was grateful for that posi or I'd be stuck there. That's how I found out the rear brakes weren't grabbing and that the posi certainly was fully functional. This shook me up because the truck reacted so oddly, as if I was going twice as fast, and that's what had me white knuckle freaked out driving it home. It was scary! All good now.

[Bones72Super]

Glad it worked out that you didn't slide into the street sign while doing some Dukes of Hazard moves. I would love to see a dash cam clip of that scenario including a close up of your face lol. I have the same Power-Lok rear axle in my 72 K2500. Wet roads and spirited driving are certainly fun until you get caught out. Keep the shiny side up Tim

[RustyPile]

I've rebuilt and built a few GM positrac diffs during my tenure as a line mechanic and race car builder back in the day, and I've seen a few "stubborn' axles act like that.. Most of the time it's a clutch alignment issue, not a crud buildup.. That's not to say crud buildup wasn't your issue.. But the clue is you said when you tried to shove the axle home it made a metallic noise.. My guess is when you removed the axle the first time, one of the clutches rotated slightly.. Giving the axle a few very slight twists usually realigns everything, and the axle can be pushed "home"...

When I assemble a posi, the last step before installing the carrier, I use the stubs of a couple well worn axles to check the clutch alignment.. When the stubs will go in and out easily, so will the axles once the carrier is installed..

[special-K]

Originally Posted by Bones72Super

Glad it worked out that you didn't slide into the street sign while doing some Dukes of Hazard moves. I would love to see a dash cam clip of that scenario including a close up of your face lol. I have the same Power-Lok rear axle in my 72 K2500. Wet roads and spirited driving are certainly fun until you get caught out. Keep the shiny side up Tim

It would be fun to see. My seat is saddle color, the mess hardly showed up . I never panic when the rear comes around. I have plenty of experience with that from jammin' second hard the first time I drove a '69 Z/28 (and 40 more years of that), to rain & snow, jack knifing, to in the loose stuff off road. This acted like never before. I was a manuvering sumbugger trying all the tricks with nothing working. A lot of factors came together for worse case deal it seems.

Originally Posted by RustyPile

I've rebuilt and built a few GM positrac diffs during my tenure as a line mechanic and race car builder back in the day, and I've seen a few "stubborn' axles act like that.. Most of the time it's a clutch alignment issue, not a crud buildup.. That's not to say crud buildup wasn't your issue.. But the clue is you said when you tried to shove the axle home it made a metallic noise.. My guess is when you removed the axle the first time, one of the clutches rotated slightly.. Giving the axle a few very slight twists usually realigns everything, and the axle can be pushed "home"...

When I assemble a posi, the last step before installing the carrier, I use the stubs of a couple well worn axles to check the clutch alignment.. When the stubs will go in and out easily, so will the axles once the carrier is installed..

I think that was it, and the crud was keeping it there. I had tried all the wiggle wobble twisting and figured it needed something more. Once we got it aligned and the shaft to slide home out of the housing, it was handled very gingerly to hold what we had on it's way back to and into the housing Thanks for sharing this info.