Working on a 12 f350. We replaced this front axle u-joint about a year ago, and about a month ago my dad said it started clunking. Got it in to the shop today and super surprised to see the ears on both shaft ends completely gone and the u joint no where to be seen!

My question, what the hell could have caused this? I've installed u joints on these types of shafts quite a few times over the years and never seen this before. Only thing I can think of is possibly the ears may have had cracks that I didn't notice, and eventually failed and just sent the u joint in to orbit. My dad is not a careful man either, and when asked he had fairly vague answers about when it blew up again and whether it had some hard strain on it at the time or whatnot.

 

Was a torch used at some point? Or a really cheap brand of u-joint.
Looks bad for sure. I've seen guys just beat the crap out of the ears and joint trying to remove
them and they end up putting hairline cracks in the metal. If your using a hammer or sledge somewhere
in the process then my guess is that is the cause.

 

Well a torch was used to cut out the old u joint. But I mean I've done that before on countless others and never had this happen!

I don't use a hammer either, I use the c shaped u joint kit.

 

Too much torque on the bolts?