Gear installs

[truckjohn]

Hey all

In the middle of a gear install for a HP D30.

Any helpful hints would be appreciated:

Wow, the learning curve of these sorts of things is tall..
Good think the axle is sitting around and I don't have to drive on it yet.....

A couple things I learned the hard way:

Reverse cut gears pattern as a mirror image of standard cut gears pattern --
The drive side of the gear is where the Coast side of a standard cut gear lives....
Nothing out there tells you this... I guess they just assume you would know it....

There is an intentional under-cut at the bottom of the gear tooth....
The actual bottom of the "Flank" is only about 2/3 of the way down from the "Face".

Swarf in the bearings ruins your patterns.... brass flecks
and plastic bits smoosh out, but make setting backlash a pain in the @$$.
Same for pinion depth.

Spin the differential/pinion about 100 revolutions before taking any measurements
or patterns. This gives things a chance to settle down and seat properly.
See above note about trash in bearings.

Heavily oiled bearings pattern much better than lightly oiled bearings.
Not only does it float trash out, it also makes things spin easier......

I want a press.

Patterns... don't look like you expect them to....
Yukon's manual is great for getting the basic idea across about
patterns....

A couple sites I found useful so far:

Zuk's Gear Install site is real good:
http://www.gearinstalls.com

This site explains the mechanics of how gears work about the best...
and why the pattern doesn't actually go all the way down......:
http://www.vibratesoftware.com/html_...ine_runout.htm

Yukon's Gear Install manual at Randy's
http://www.ring-pinion.com/downloads/yukoninstman.pdf

Best regards

John

[Stu Olson]

In regards to the 100 pinion revolutions to help set things into place, I've found that a few well placed dead blow hits will accomplish the same thing.

As for the press, I use to believe the same thing. I was shown an easy method by which pinion and carrier bearings can be installed using only a piece of properly sized pipe and a 3 pound hammer. I was skeptical until I tried it several times and found out it works quite well.

[truckjohn]

Yeah,

100 revolutions is a bit of an exaggeration...

The weird thing I noticed about patterns....
The pattern going from pinion too deep to pinion too shallow....

The edges of the pattern seem to show what is happening.... the edges move from being wide on the bottom of the tooth to wide on the top...

/ \ Too deep [ ] about right

\__/ too shallow.

Best regards

John

[Chile99]

Sounds like you are doing ok so far. Getting your pinion preload in range makes getting your pattern much easier, The dead blow hammer is the way to settle things in quickly as already mentioned. Rotate the ring gear with one of its attachment bolts instead of rotating the pinion also helps to get a clear pattern quickly. You do not need a press, a trip to the hardware store for proper sized pipe to match your inner races is my preferred method and I have a press. TAKE YOUR TIME! Hope you made a set of try bearings, easy. Helps tremendously.
John

[bart]

Originally posted by Chile99
Hope you made a set of try bearings, easy. Helps tremendously.

Biggest help in doing a gear install.

[truckjohn]

It's a shame it isn't easier to make up a set of "Try races" for the pinion depth.

My HP-30 does the pinion depth with shims behind the inner pinion race -- pretty much no easy way to do it without a long brass punch and a big hammer....

Same for pinion preload shims... the only easy way to set it is in and out and in and out until it is right.

Honestly, I would love to know how they do it at Sterling or Dana. I know they can't be spending all day long on shimming and re-shimming axles, so they must have some good way to do it quickly.

Best regards

John

[Chile99]

I just finished a HP 30. I do have a set of try races for the pinion shaft as well as try bearings. The tech's at mfg.'s use really expensive gages to set these up easily and quickly. You can do a lot with cubic dollars, just look at our Jeeps. I usually start HP 30's with 040-041 on each side of the carrier and 038-040 on the pinion depth. I can usually quickly find the depth from a test pattern, this centers pattern when correct. Set backlash. Then tweak it in. A die grinder or dremel with an abrasive wheel makes quick work of reducing the OD of the pinion races as well as the ID of all bearings. Don't get carried away, I make these to have a "push fit". Rarely have to change anything when I press my final bearings on. When looking at the pattern on a reverse cut gearset do not be too proud to look at the other side of the ring gear, sometimes it is easier to dial in. When either side is on the other side has to be close. Worry about centering the pattern more top of tooth to root. Far more important than hitting the dead centerline of the tooth along it's major length. I usually try to set what is called a competition setup.The pattern is to the inside slightly from a perfect center, but always try to center top to bottom. Hope this makes sense and helps.
John

[truckjohn]

well, got it all finished up.

Really, the gears were the longest part of the install. Knuckles and such off of the old axle were easy.

Took it out for its maiden voyage last night -- didn't run it in 4x4 yet, as the rear axle isn't done yet.... but all seems smooth and quiet.

Gonna do the rear axle this weekend. Hopefully, all will go much faster -- I have real Spicer gears and full install kit for the rear...

Best regards

John

[Chile99]

You will find the Dana gears one of the easiest to set up. What back lash and what shim heights did you end up with on your HP 30. Do you know how to read the pinion heights and how to use them on the Dana gears, if not give a shout.
John

[Allen]

How much shim would you start with on the pinion of a bare 44 housing?

Allen

[Croaker]

Originally posted by Allen
How much shim would you start with on the pinion of a bare 44 housing?

Allen

About [holds up fingers] THIS much.

Oh wait, that didn't help too much, did it?

I just finished putting the 4.56s in my 8.8. I'm glad my neighbor is an ex-drag-racer.

Sounds like you are "getting there" with that swap, Allen.

[Chile99]

Originally posted by Allen
How much shim would you start with on the pinion of a bare 44 housing?

Allen

Allen this might help: http://www.gounitrax.com/UNITRAX/pages/diffassspec.html

[Allen]

Thanks.

I was thinking .040, but they said to start with .035.

Allen

[Chile99]

035 is commonly the std. for Dana starting point. I don't think I ever did a 44 that that was enough shims for Dana gears.
John

[truckjohn]

On the HP-30, I ended up with a pinion depth of 0.038" and a BL of 0.007".

I was pretty suprised -- the original shims under the pinion were 0.048" -- 0.010" deeper than the shims for the Genuine Gears. Those Genuine gears seem to make patterns that are hard to read.

My D-44 this weekend..... 4.56 gears by Dana -- wow, they really do pattern like the book says..... and the shims went in just like they were supposed to. The old pinion was a +1, the new one was a +2. Old shims -0.001" was the correct pinion depth w/ BL 0.007". That is how good QC works.

I had the axle setup with minimum preload, but then when I preloaded the bearings, I must have switched the shims -- went from 0.007" to 0.024" BL.... DAMMIT... so tonight, it is coming out again to fix the shims.

Snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory once again.

Best regards

John

[Chile99]

I have found some setups with Genuine Gears a pain in the @#X$. I just get Dana or US and prefer the Dana if I can get them for the Dana axles. Sounds like you are ahead of the pack. A Rubber hammer (dead blow) and patience are your best tools beyond your measuring devices, By the way if you need one Park Tool makes a really good and economical inch pound torque wrench for these set up's. $32
John

[truckjohn]

I do have one of those park tool inch-lb torque wrenches.
Props to Zuk on that one.

I swapped the shims side to side. I looked at my notes,
and somehow I transposed the drivers and passenger side numbers....
then trusted my notes instead of my organization
(Hmmmm, why are these bearings on the wrong sides of the bench?)

Put them back on the right sides -- BL 0.008", preload just right, pattern
just right... yay

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory round II.......

Note to self... always check the seals that come with the parts kit.....

Stupid D44 Dana kit comes with the wrong seal to do the new Jeep D44 axles....

The seal in the kit just keeps going and going and going and going in.....
Hmmm, something's not right here....

Stupid parts kit. Anyway, off to find the correct seal tomorrow.

Best regards

John

[Chile99]

Sorry to be laughing MAO but I thought things like that only happened to me. Heck, talk about orginization. I grabbed a box of gears off my shelf that was marked a used set of 4.10 and set them up before I noticed they were 3.54, same as I had just pulled out. My bad orginazation and haste. As I said earlier don't get in a hurry. Take care.
John

[Kampy]

Originally posted by truckjohn

Note to self... always check the seals that come with the parts kit.....

Stupid D44 Dana kit comes with the wrong seal to do the new Jeep D44 axles....

The seal in the kit just keeps going and going and going and going in.....
Hmmm, something's not right here....

Stupid parts kit. Anyway, off to find the correct seal tomorrow.

Best regards

John

In case you didn't find that seal yet, it's a national 50660, and its the same seal for both the newer 44 and 30.

Also you can sucessfully use the seal you got in the kit, just put some rtv around the outside edge and drive it in flush with the edge of the housing, it will be fine.

One more note . . . don't go to jeep looking for the seal you need, they will give you the one you already have. Don't ask me how I know.

[Chile99]

I think that seal is also a NAPA 15788.
John

[truckjohn]

I got the right seal from the dealership.

I could not get that National 50660 seal anywhere -- I tried to cross it over to something.... no dice. Even tried to cross over the Factory # to something... no dice.

For some reason, the seal says National, but only shows up as a Dana Spicer part #.

Got it all together last night and went on a trip around the block to check for weird noises. So far, all is well. I will do some driving this evening.

Best regards

John