Alrighty folks, I finished welding the C's on the HO72/60 housing, made my inner axle shafts, and got some more done on my e-brake setup. I won't make everyone bored with too many words here, the pictures speak for themselves.
C's welded on and inner shafts finished, everything on the housing just to see how it looks.
And some shots of the welds on the C's and Shafts.... Something to note on how I welded these, I did a root pass with pulsed spray transfer MIG, which is extremely hot and penetrates very deep, followed by a filler pass over that with pulsed spray transfer to fill the weld area out to a proper size and for more fusion between the C and the housing itself, then all of that covered up with a TIG weld doing a weave pattern, to fill in any under cut from the pulsed spray welds and to make it look good (mostly just to make it look good though
). This was a bit challenging to coax a TIG weld this size from a 200amp Miller Dynasty machine, I had it cranked up to the full 200 amps with high speed amperage pulse turned on for some extra punch and floored almost the whole time, and this was while it was still warm from the pulsed spray welds!
(Passenger side C)
(Drivers side C)
(Passenger side C again)
Axle shafts were fully TIG welded. Shafts used a 3/4'' pilot that was pressed into the yokes, plug welded on the bridge area of the yoke, and welded around the base of the yoke/beveled step down to pilot size of the shaft with 3 passes (root, filler, cover).
An attempt at an artsy photo of the Eaton tag that I put on the housing...
How the Eaton tag looks head on, I think it turned out pretty cool. Hopefully when the truck is all done, someone will see that Eaton tag that knows a thing or two about these old trucks and question what kind of axle its got under it.
And the e-brake assembly, will be bolting it up to one of my NP205's over the weekend to make sure everything fits like it's supposed to.
Note the ribs added to the bracket for strength, since I had to remove the section of material that bridged between the two sides of the caliper, I figured a little extra strength wouldn't hurt.
And with it roughly together on the bench
Of course, I have to show off some more of the TIG welds while I'm at it. The entire bracket was TIG welded, and made of beefy 1/4'' steel.
Some more pics should follow tomorrow, I'll be putting the 3rd in the 72/60 housing and making sure the inner shaft lengths are good to go, followed by making some gussets/shock mounts for the inner c's. I also made some 1/2'' thick front shackles from 2 pieces each of 1/4'' plate, TIG welded of course. I'll probably also be finishing the transfer case mount this weekend and if I have time I'll tear into the SM465. Stay tuned!