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Reading through, didn’t see much about the spring packs, maybe I missed it. Since you did bushings, I assume that they are original springs, right? Just asking, I like the frame height and am pondering about putting my set of HB front springs in my 79sc.
Started on the front axle. What a PITA!!! Took way longer than it should have.
Removed the original Spicer lockouts to find the right side had gotten moisture in it and will require lots of cleaning. But I decided to save that for reassembly. I have NOS red "FORD" dials and new O-rings for them but Im going to do that later because I may send them off to be re-chromed.
I knew the knuckle U joints were bad and I was planning to replace the ball joints so everything had to come apart. The hubs came off easily but the spindle removal is where things went bad. Normally I can hit the spindles with a dead blow hammer twice up and twice down and they can wiggle free. Not this time. I beat them through a block of wood with a mini-sledge hammer, then upgraded to full blows with a full sized sledge hammer through a block of wood. Nothing! I went and found a tool I had for attaching a slide hammer to a spindle to remove them. Although the slide hammer was like pissing in the wind, the tool was very thick steel and I decided to hit the tool with the sledge to protect the spindle. After about five sledge blows to the tool the spindles came loose. No visible damage to the spindles thankfully!
Finally able to remove the axle shafts I took them, the spindles and the right caliper mounting bracket to my local machine shop. I had broken off one of the caliper pin retaining bolts when removing the calipers, and I decided to let them change the U-joint, and spindle inner bearings out because he would be much faster.
The knuckle U-joints were Spicer 5-760X
You can see the originals were toast!
Then he swapped out the small inner bearings in the spindle in a few seconds rather than the minutes of frustration that it would have taken me.
Notice the rust around the large part of the spindle. That's what was holding me up. I took the wire wheel on my bench grinder and removed the heavy rust and coated it with anti-sieze before reinstalling.
The caliper mount turned into a challenge even for him. He ended up just drilling a new hole through where the bolt was and re-threading the hole.
After getting home I had to install the spindle seal kits. Spicer 706527X seal kits contain the large knuckle dust seal, the inner spindle bearing(installed at machine shop), the seal for the spindle bearing, and the plastic thrust washer that goes on the axle shaft. Added some grease for assembly.
As I was working on the spindle seals the UPS man showed up with a pleasant surprise!
The correct spring bushings for the front eyelet of the front leaf springs! Moog K201111. I ordered two even though the pictures online showed two in each picture I assumed it was for the photos they showed different angles because it didn't say how many per package, even on Moog's website.. But they came two per box. So now I have four of them. Oops...Guess I'll Ebay the extras later.
I installed them with a combination of a hammer/socket, and a ball joint press. After pressing them in I put the front springs in place and tightened all the spring bolts and U-bolts. And gave the U-bolts some paint to prevent ugly rust.
Don't mind the blocks and jack. lol. While getting violent with the spindles earlier I knocked the blocks over. Oops. Unfortunately I don't have a shop yet, nor concrete so jack stands are pretty useless in the sandy dirt here.
Next came the ball joints.
The upper ball joint castle nut was impossible to get off because the cotter pin had rusted into the ball joint and I broke it to the point of no return trying to remove it. So I just took my angle grinder and cut it off just below the castle part of the castle nut, removing the cotter pin from the equation. lol.
I took a 1 1/8" socket and breaker bar and removed the lower ball joint nut through the spindle hole. then removed the lower remaining half of the upper ball joint castle nut. This still gave me enough upper ball joint to strike with a hammer and knock loose. a few hits with the mini sledge did the trick. The knuckles popped right off! I was surprised after how the rest of the day was going.
Once the knuckles were off I swapped out the ball joints with the ball joint press and it actually went pretty well. Other than wishing I had a shop with a workbench and large vise.
When I purchase the ball joints I decided to save a few bucks and I later regretted it. I bought some old stock ball joints off Ebay of Spicer and AC Delco branding. They were cheaply priced and since both were made by Spicer (The axle's OEM) I thought it was a good idea. They looked great, and fit great. The blue seals will look good on the blue truck. But... I went to install the last upper ball joint, opened the box and there was the hardware for an upper, but a lower ball joint was in the upper ball joint box. Noooooo!!!! The other three were already installed. I called around and finally found one upper ball joint in town. It was Moog which is usually my preferred brand. After purchasing it locally I had then spent more money than I had saved by buying the old stock ones from Ebay. The new Moog upper had a black seal rather than blue like the others which irritated me but I quickly noticed the Moog was far superior to the others. I wish I had just bought all four Moog ball joints. Why was it superior you ask? There was a few reasons, but the main one was the fact that the grease zerk came off the bottom side rather than the bottom middle. You can grease it easily without using adapters or fighting to change out the bottom plug for a zerk. The other side had to be greased, then plugged because the zerk would have hit the knuckle U-joint. I wanted to take it all back apart and install all Moog ball joints, but I was almost out of time before my next lengthy business trip.
Do yourself a favor and use Moog K8194T Upper, and Moog K8195T Lower.
A picture of the Moog upper ball joint vs the Spicer.
Notice the Moog has a grease zerk easily accessible from the back.
While the Spicer has a plug that must be swapped out for a zerk to be greased because the U joint would hit the zerk.
MAN!!!
Looking good....
I know it attacks your pocket book but you are coming out in the end with a brand new front axle!
Great job!
Keep up the good work!
I reinstalled the spindles after taking the outer edge to the wire wheel to remove the rust that have me such trouble removing them, and gave a light coating of anti-sieze for good measure.
Then it was on to the hub and rotor. I tried removing the lug studs with a hammer but they wouldn't budge. I had to go use the hydraulic press at my friends house. They still didn't give up without a fight. Every last one on both hubs.
After getting the studs off and the rotor removed I cleaned the old wheel bearing grease out and put the bearings in the parts washer to soak.
The new rotors look way better! Lol.
Raybestos 6056R rotors.
Installation of the studs went better than removal but getting that last bit to make them tight took some hard hits.
New front wheel seals SKF 25077 were installed.
I started getting short on time before the wind was supposed to get bad. So I wanted to get everything greasy sealed up before the dust started blowing.
I really needed to clean and re-grease the lockouts but with the winds picking up I just put it together for now. I will take it apart later and clean them up. I noticed the passenger side had got moisture in it and there was some damage to the inner lockout components. That will be addressed later. I may send them out for re-chromeing, I also have NOS dials and seals!
Thanks for the kind words Mike! It's looking better now than I ever remember it looking. lol.
Had some time to get the new tie rod installed. Had to grind off the old castle nut on the tie rod too.
Moog DS837 for the long half of the tie rod.
Moog ES444L for the short, driver side.
Moog ES2012S for the adjustment sleeve.
Not much to say, just adjusted it close to the old one. I'll make the fine adjustment later when tires are back on.
Sadly, this will end my progress for a while. I have another long business trip ahead. But I will resume when I return!
I'm back! And after dealing with other stuff I am finally once again making some progress.
Got the new bed floor delivered. Not looking forward to that part of the project.
Quality doesn't look too bad. Unfortunately even though its brand new it will still need a lot of modifications to make it fit. Since the highboy chassis is narrower I will need to fill and redrill the 8 mounting bolt holes to fit the highboy chassis. But that's a later job.
I finished reassembling the front disc brakes. new Raybestos brake pads PGD450M and rebuilt Raybestos calipers FRC7013, FRC7014. The rebuilt calipers included disc brake hardware.
I applied silicone grease to the caliper sliders, and anti-sieze to the caliper pin locking bolt to avoid the nightmare from before.
I also applied anti-sieze to the bleeder screw and banjo bolt for the brake hose. I still remember what it's like working on a midwestern vehicle.
New front brake hoses were installed. Dorman H36810 (right side), and Dorman H36805 (left side). Also new banjo bolts Dorman 13947. And new clips to hold the hoses on the brackets.
It's so much less frustrating installing the new stuff!
Next I Installed new front shocks and upper shock brackets. Monroe 34909 shocks.
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Why was it superior you ask? There was a few reasons, but the main one was the fact that the grease zerk came off the bottom side rather than the bottom middle. You can grease it easily without using adapters or fighting to change out the bottom plug for a zerk. The other side had to be greased, then plugged because the zerk would have hit the knuckle U-joint. I wanted to take it all back apart and install all Moog ball joints, but I was almost out of time before my next lengthy business trip.
