[Oil burnin']

I'm trying to get my daily driver back together. It's getting a true track in the front Dana 44. I am not getting good backlash readings. So I look carefully and they put such a big radius in the corner where the shims go under the bearings that the shim won't sit flat on the sholder. Tryed some shims from a different kit but they're the same. The bearing goes on fine because it has a big radius too but since the shims won't sit flat backlash is all messed up......

Damn damn- I wanted it back together tonight. I don't want to grind out the inside of the shims with a die grinder. I guess I could chuck it in the lathe and square up the sholders. Anybody have an answer please?

 

[Brutpwr]

Just open them up what ever way is easiest. They are only spacers---just get the opening as even as possible but it does not really matter. The backlash is just a starting point. Sometimes especially with certain brands or ratios the backlash must be set out of spec to get a good pattern.

Jason

 

[Oil burnin']

Well I put the shims in the lathe with rubber on each of the 3 jaws of the chuch and the whold shim pack with the thick ones on the outside and ground them out with the die grinder while the chuck was turning slowly. They got kind of hot and turned blue which must have made them soft. They fell out a couple of times too. They sure aren't nice and flat anymore and I will have to debur them. Why couldn't Detroit True track make the bearing mounts like the Dana's

 

[Triaged]

Sounds like a problem with the spacers to me and not with the carrier. THe fillet radius should be as large as posable to make it stronger. If the bearing fits on fine then the proplem is with the spacers.

 

[Gordon]

It always works this way. You need to put the set up bearings on with a press, even if you can put them on by hand. This "dimple dies" the shims so everything is the same as when you actually press the real bearings on.

If the ID of the beaing cleared that radius then you would have to very carefully center the shim before pressing the bearing on. The way it is, works great just press the bearings on to form the shims. They should look like the shims that you took out from the old carrier.

 

[Oil burnin']

Gordon, You are RIGHT! I just poste seconds after you....

Does this mean I can't really use set up bearings? Those washers are hard and springy and don't form very easily.

I called the tech line and they said that this is common and that their installer usually uses old shims that have been "mushroomed" to fit the fillet. I am using set up bearings and they just spring back and forth giving me faulty readings. I want to set it up with proper pre load and backlash for obvious reasons.

Now I don't want to use the shims I ground out because they could shift sidways like a stack of dimes because the center hols is bigger and they have so much burring on them from grinding that they will give false readings too.

I'm going to look at some of my old shims and see if they are "mushroomed".

 

[Gordon]

I just mushroom the new shims on the press. I just push the set up bearings on with 10 or 20 tons of force and it seems to mushroom the shims just fine.