Here is what the differential carrier looked like while still mounted in the housing:
The ring-side bearing fell apart as soon as I took the carrier out of the housing. Here are the bearings and the carrier.
Close-up of the rollers. Continue reading
I noticed this area inside the differential housing was ground down. I guess the carrier bearings were so worn that the bolt-side of the carrier was flexing into the housing.
That’s not so bad, but this next part is. I did more reading this morning and found an article about what to look for when you are buying a used axle. When I read the caption of this photo, the proverbial gears in my head started turning, and when I walked out to go look, my heart sank. That critical surface has in fact been ground down all to hell. Even if I did have a carrier that fit correctly, I would never be able to get the preload right. Continue reading
The quadrasteer variant of the Dana 60 has 12 bolt holes instead of 10. A standard gasket is shown on the right.
If you call a Dana Spicer dealer, they will want to know the “Bill of Materials” or “Build Number”. Mine is 606932-3. This is not a very common axle, it won’t be in their database, and the dealer will have to call Dana directly to get you what you need. Most likely, unless you spend lots of money with the dealer and they know you well, they will not be very helpful or friendly. Such is life. So far, I’ve found that everything inside the housing are normal Dana 60 parts, except the carrier.
The new Dana Trac-Lok carrier I ordered doesn’t fit. (Supposed to be a standard Dana 60 component) It is overall about 3/16″ shorter than the one that came out of the axle. I didn’t think that would be necessarily wrong, so I looked at the dimension between the carrier shim surface and the ring mounting surface.
Original: 1.255″ New: 1.120″
Comparing the ring side edge of the carrier to the ring mount surface, I get:
Original: 2.266 New: 2.134″
Overall length:
Original: 8-18/32″ (8.5625) New: 8-12/32″ (8.375)
Shim surface to shim surface:
Original: 6-1/2″ (6.5) New: 6-10/32″ (6.3125)
This seems like it will take 3/16″ of extra shims. I don’t think this is right, that is a big hunk of shims. I don’t think I’m going to be able to finish this project today, I’ve gotta get the right carrier.
NOTE: to see all my posts about the Dana 60 Axle, click here.
I knew I’d have to press the pinion and carrier bearings (multiple times) for this job i’m in the middle of right now, and that would wind up costing me as much as the cost of a brand new hydraulic press from Harbor Freight. When I set it up Tuesday night I could not get it squared up correctly. There is a reason stuff from that store is so cheap. It is made is China, and tolerances are probably not important to the manufacture. I tried tightening it all up with Amber’s help holding it square and couldn’t get it right, so I decided to take another path. I bought a couple of turnbuckles and a piece of all thread from Home Depot. Then I welded some tabs on and created cross braces that let me dial in tension either way. It seems to work pretty good. I’ve needed a press before, so I’m glad to have one finally.
Bryson and I went down to our neighborhood park for National Night Out tonight. He was in a hurry to eat his hotdog so he could go play.
The rear axle on a Quadrasteer equiped vehicle is a Dana 60. It is a pretty common unit that was used on the front of many 1 ton trucks in the 70s, 80s and 90s, and some muscle cars in the 60s and 70s. Even though this is on the rear of my pickup, most of the parts and procedures are similar to a front axle, since the wheels steer. (only move maximum of 15 degrees, instead of normal 40 degrees) These are the steps I took to remove and replace the carrier, ring, and pinion. I’ve included the recommended tightening specs for reference during assembly.
Remove the wheels.
The rear-steer action is accomplished with a electric servo motor, gear box, and tie-rods. It is mounted to a special differential cover housing. I think all of the internal parts are the industry-standard Dana 60 parts, which is a really good thing because there are so many different parts and options available for it. Continue reading
And when I say successful, I’m using it in the same sense Tom Hanks did in the movie ‘The Green Mile’ after they electrocuted that guy without any water on the sponge. The quadrasteer motor and gearbox block access to a couple of the differential cover bolts. Not a big deal, but I used one of my fancy GearWrenches in a way that left the wrench stuck on the bolt, wedged between the gearbox, with no way to get the bolt in or out.
I wound having to cut the bolt off.
Once I removed the axle shafts, I could tell I had a big problem.
I was all worried that I wouldn’t be able to get the carrier out since I didn’t have the special housing spreader tool. Turns out it fell right out under its own weight once I removed the bearing caps. The shims were non-existent. I’m guessing they were eaten up in the gears. The ring-side bearing was a mess. I’m glad I finally decided to take care of this, because I’m sure it would have failed in a ugly way soon.
Getting the pinion out was a big pain. I gave up trying to hold the block of wood in one hand and hit it with a sledge hammer held in the other hand. I decided to sacrifice the pinion nut and beat away with both hands. The problem was that I distorted the nut so bad I couldn’t get my socket back on it to get it off. I finally persuaded it to work the way I wanted it to, again, with the sledge hammer.
One last complaint: My impact wrench didn’t have enough ass to get the skid plate bolts or the caliper bolts loose. I think this is because of the super thread lock compound used to assemble these parts with. They were NOT going to come off under natural causes.
NOTE: to see all my posts about the Dana 60 Axle, click here.
I jacked quadzilla up by the frame instead of the axle this time and noticed that sitting on the jack stands is about the height I want it to be. The top of the wheels are the same height as the lower edge of the body. I consider this to be the proper height.
I started the work to remove the rear differential carrier today. I didn’t get too far though, got started too late. I did get the wheels off, the spare tire removed, rear tie rods disconnected, parking brake linkage off. I noticed that one of the exhaust hanger brackets was broke. I re-welded it back together, poorly. I included a picture here to show off how bad I am at welding! The factory exhaust mounts are so much better than the custom ones… The engineers spend time to get things like that right, they have to last for as long as the car, and they usually do. The magnetic drain plug had a bunch of crud attached to it. It might just be posi-traction clutch material, or it might be something worse, still haven’t taken off the differential cover yet.
