Found this on the web and I have noticed that all of the competition guys are running these. I did not see one CTM at the last competition, so apparantly this does well. Sam, maybe you may want to do this to save your 44 shafts for a bit longer. Anyone hear of any downside to this?? tell me more about the larger U-joint that you mentioned. What modification are necessary to get this to fit? How much bigger is it?

"Welding in the caps can save the shafts for future use. If a u-joint fails and the caps are welded in, the caps are less likely to pop out and hit the ball joint. Once the caps hit the ball joint, normally the yokes from both shafts will stretch making both shafts useless. With Dana 44 axle shafts, I normally see about twenty u-joint failures for ever one axle shaft failure, so the u-joints are really the weak link. It doesn't matter if you are running junk yard shafts or high dollar after-market shafts, the u-joints are almost always the part that fails. If the upper ball joint is hit with a cap that has walked out, the whole knuckle can pop off, which is real unpleasant. If the knuckle comes off, both shafts are normally ruined and the tie rod breaks.

The welded in caps are great at providing an early warning system to axle failure. Once the weld breaks, you know it is time to replace the shaft. The weld breaks when the cap starts to get pushed out or the yoke stretches. If the shaft is replaced early, the damage can be greatly reduced.

The key to welding in the caps is weld enough material to hold the cap in place, but not hurt the operation of the universal joint. All that is required is a tack weld on the edge of the cap. The best place is in the middle closest to the splined end. The outside of the yoke is the weakest part and you don't want to damage the strength of it. If you weld on the sides, it can interfere with the installation of the shaft (unless you have Ford knuckles and spindles). Most Jeep and Chevy knuckles and spindles have just enough room to install the shaft and a tack weld on the outside would make it difficult to impossible to install or remove the shaft. The weld should be as close to the splined end as possible.

If the other side of the shaft breaks or the u-joint breaks, the tack weld can be ground down with an angle grinder to remove the cap. When a new cap is welded in, any material that was ground away will be replaced. There are a limited number of times you will want to reuse the shafts. Even if a shaft doesn't break, only the other shaft breaks or the u-joint breaks, the yokes will stretch a little. The more times you reuse a shaft that has been in a past break, the more times you will break. A slightly stretched shaft is more likely to have a cap bind up or crack the weld. Once the weld is broken on a shaft that has a stretched yoke, the cap will walk out and make fatal contact with the ball joint. If the caps slide right in the yoke and don't require any hammering to install, throw the shaft away. "

http://66.216.68.23/4x4/jeep/tech/axle/caps01/close297.jpg

Funny story about welded caps:
When we were building Rocitillo Rapids, one of the club members broke an inner shaft. Turns out he had welded the caps on the dana 44 joints while they were in place. Because of the size of the weld bead, he could not pull the joints through the knuckles. Had to pull him out. This guy was great at fabing stuff. I wish I had his skills. Just overlooked a small detail.

One problem to watch out for is when you do brake a u-joint, don't run it very long (a few feet at most). In the past few months, I have seen two ball joints sheared by a u-joint. Even worse, people tend to drive a bit further with the sheared ball joint, until the knuckle falls away from the axle! This happened to one of the club members a few years ago (took out his brakes), and happened to one of the people on the CC trail that Lance and I lead this year. Never seen this happen on a dana 60 because I have never seen a dana 60 u-joint fail. Usually the shafts fail on a 60.

Rich

I don't know if this relates to having welded caps or not, but yesterday on the way to the new shop I saw a full size Blazer that had the outer knuckle shear off in just the manner described in the previous post. He was CROSSING A BRIDGE when the axle gave way, locked up both front wheels, skidded across oncoming traffic forcing another car off the shoulder, heading for the CLIFF just before the bridge. Luckily the car stopped about 10 feet from going down a 100 ft. embankment into the river (deep one too).

The Blazer dug two trenches in the shoulder of the road after he managed to cheat death and cross the bridge.

The passenger tire was cocked at a non-factory angle and looked pretty precarious.

D60 owners BEWARE!!! Hehe.

I don't know enough about the design of that axle to know how to prevent it or if it's a chronic safety problem. Enlighten me!

Michael

Yes I have heard of this before.

This is why everyone goes to full circle retainer clips instead of the c clip. The stock c clip will fall off and the cap moves and voila you bust a joint cause the cap walks outwards.

I have noticed some of my caps have moved a bit, they have rotated but none of them have walked out. I always have a look at the unis before I go hard wheeling to make sure the caps havent moved.

Although by the looks of that article I should weld them (and then grind off the excess so I can still get the axle out. :D )

Good stuff. :beer:

Sam

the knuckle popping off is a commom occurence on D44 and smaller axles... they guy who owned my truck before me had an EB 44 in the front and he blew off the knuckle once in the middle of a frozen pond :D

wanst fun. here it is, 18deg out, snowing, in Vermont, in December, with a truck with a completely blown apart front end in the middle of a pond. much to everyones relief his lovely wife broke out the smoky joe grill and started cooking burgers for everyone while we fixed the rig.

after 2 hrs or so, the knuckle was back on and the truck was in 3 wheel drive.

total carnage- 1 totally wrecked fender, one inner and one outer axle broken, one broken u joint, ripped brakelines, and a lot of half frozen fingers :D

i wish i had remembered to take pics as it was truly a sight to be seen.