Alright guys, I pulled the diff cover off and everything looks fine. However the passenger side axle shaft u joint is resting on the ball joint, so I know there is stress on its respective spider gear. When I wiggle the axle shaft I can see the spider gear has some lateral play to it. I am at the point where I am unsure if I need to replace the diff or just the passenger side bearing assembly. How can I diagnose if there is critical damage I cannot see to spider gears/ carrier assembly? I can't really afford to buy parts I dont need, but I want this to be fixed properly.

As of now, the differential isn't in as poor of shape as I had suspected. Anyone have any advice on what I should do? What to look for regarding internal damage to my gear set?

Thanks in advance!

 

Pull the axleshaft. It's probably broken.

 

Ken might be right, but with the long passenger axle, the angle at the spider gear, and the slack in the splines probably means nothing is wrong with the spider gear.

 

Well what do you mean angle at the spider gear? The axleshaft is intact I'm just worried about that torque on the spider gear from the long axle shaft not being suppoted on the wheel bearing end of the big axle. Everything looks fine, I just dont want to think its fixed and then have it break again

 

Either way you're going to have to pull the shaft. It shouldn't rest on the balljoint.

 

Well I've already pulled the shaft, I just don't know how to diagnose if my differential is indeed damaged or not... the axle shaft is a gonner, but I just find it hard to believe that all the torque of the axle shaft on the spider gear didnt damage it in some way shape of form. Is there a diagnosis procedure?

 

They make a good tool for that, whats that thingamabob called...??? oh yeah a ford 9".

 

Best was is going to be to pull the other shaft out and pop the entire carrier out and have a good look. You might get away with just pulling the spiders and side gears out but its not much more work to just get it out and cleaned up and inspect the gears, carrier bearings etc.

 

I don't think you have anything to worry about. If I recall correctly, the Dana 60 doesn't transfer any of the load to the gears (full or semi full floating axle design) so the axle shaft and bearings will carry the load.

 

I mean, the axle is at an angle, drooping down. The splines at the axle/spider-gear have enough play that the axle hanging like that isn't going to put a whole lot of load on the spider gear.

Were you using 4x4 while this was like this? If not, you have NOTHING to worry about. And if you were, you'd have heard a lot of noise, and stopped, right?

The only thing that might be an issue is the oil seal in the axle tube might need to be replaced.

Yeah, because they put 9" rears in the front-end of a Superduty, right?

 

Why is it a gonner? Side gears and spiders will have a degree or 2 of play.
Post up a pic of the bad shaft so we can take a look.

 

Will do tomorrow, hangover day interupted my progress...

Krewat, I tried to use 4x4 once and it completely didn't work so I turned it off and used my girl friend's dads chevy to pull me out of the ditch. This was before the hub melted down... other than that I've had no need for 4x4. But I do have an interesting picture here of what happened when my 4x4 went out. I'm glad my GF's dad had a sense of humor about my attempted escape from the ditch

 

unless the whole shaft is hanging low all the way to the pumpkin, i would guess that the issue is in the outside hub. the shaft is only supported by the differential bearing and the one that holds the outer spindle in the middle of the locking hub

 

I honestly am starting to believe the diff is fine, the spider gears are tight to my fingers and only rotate, no play without the axle helping them. So here's the pictures, will caption beneath



Starting out... nice hot spots on them rotors, yay.



While trying to remove the rotor the whole wheel bearing came out. Rotor is still on it, but ehh no biggie. Not that it's off the truck I have more room to apply my BFH. Ironically, that don't look like I remembered. I think this is catastrophic wheel bearing failure



My memory aint as good as she used to be, but I vaguely remember needle bearings in there. Hmmmm.... definitely catastrophic wheel bearing failure



As you can see in this example, the axle is FUBAR. You can see where my U-Joint banged up my ball joints. It took the grease fitting off and 'forged' the bottom of the top u- joint flush with the knuckle and made the threaded portion of the bottom u joint smoosh over the nut holding it in. Happy Days

 

Ouch....I wouldnt trust them GM jack stands holding up my FORD LOL