napkinthief
Member
bear with me, i have pretty decent experience mechanically, just never dealt with certain aspects before, like replacing a ujoint, or what certain parts are properly called.
i replaced the carrier bearing on the rear 2 piece driveshaft. was much simpler then it first seemed. no biggie. the ujoints are solid. tracing a clicking noise, i found a loose ujoint on the front drive shaft. it was the u joint furthest away from the engine, the last one on the shaft, before the transfercase.. anywho
i picked up both available sizes at advance auto. they got lifetime warranty. i figure i can do the work, so let me save the bucks and use this. one was just slightly larger than the other, about 1/16 of an inch so i grabbed both . anyway...
i stripped a front torx bolt (who uses those anyway?). i had to grind the head and chisel it off. the other 3 came out no problem. the rear side bolts were super easy.. why didnt they use the same bolts on the front?? i see posts of people replacing them to normal hex head bolts. can someone link a thread with the proper size and thread/pitch for these bolts? id prefer not to have to purchase a new torx bolt
back to the driveshaft. what a pain in the ass. the c clips holding the ujoint caps were rusted inplace. i torched and liquid wrenched them for quite a while. they didnt want to budge. the tips snapped off as i compressed. i got 2 off eventually by way of chisel and was able to seperate the shaft from the ujoint. after enough curse words in different languages, i got the old ujoint out. one of the 4 lobes was destroyed and oval... anyway, one of the 2 replacements i picked up fit, the other didnt. i used the one that fit (the 1/16" shorter arms one).
there was also now another issue, it seems theres a needle bearing assembly between the 2 ujoints there, with a tiny spring. the bearing looked gone but the spring was there. i didnt have the piece on hand (and no idea whats its called) and my truck is on the street on jacks so i had to finish to move it.. i assembled the whole thing back and it seems fine, but i definitely need that middle bearing (for lack of a better name at the moment). can someone put a name to it?
all in all, not THAT tough a job, but surely will be much easier next time.
i replaced the carrier bearing on the rear 2 piece driveshaft. was much simpler then it first seemed. no biggie. the ujoints are solid. tracing a clicking noise, i found a loose ujoint on the front drive shaft. it was the u joint furthest away from the engine, the last one on the shaft, before the transfercase.. anywho
i picked up both available sizes at advance auto. they got lifetime warranty. i figure i can do the work, so let me save the bucks and use this. one was just slightly larger than the other, about 1/16 of an inch so i grabbed both . anyway...
i stripped a front torx bolt (who uses those anyway?). i had to grind the head and chisel it off. the other 3 came out no problem. the rear side bolts were super easy.. why didnt they use the same bolts on the front?? i see posts of people replacing them to normal hex head bolts. can someone link a thread with the proper size and thread/pitch for these bolts? id prefer not to have to purchase a new torx bolt
back to the driveshaft. what a pain in the ass. the c clips holding the ujoint caps were rusted inplace. i torched and liquid wrenched them for quite a while. they didnt want to budge. the tips snapped off as i compressed. i got 2 off eventually by way of chisel and was able to seperate the shaft from the ujoint. after enough curse words in different languages, i got the old ujoint out. one of the 4 lobes was destroyed and oval... anyway, one of the 2 replacements i picked up fit, the other didnt. i used the one that fit (the 1/16" shorter arms one).
there was also now another issue, it seems theres a needle bearing assembly between the 2 ujoints there, with a tiny spring. the bearing looked gone but the spring was there. i didnt have the piece on hand (and no idea whats its called) and my truck is on the street on jacks so i had to finish to move it.. i assembled the whole thing back and it seems fine, but i definitely need that middle bearing (for lack of a better name at the moment). can someone put a name to it?
all in all, not THAT tough a job, but surely will be much easier next time.
