i have leaking rear diff on 2004 f-350 is there a torque spec when tighning pinion nut back up...thx guys

 

DRW or SRW?

 

it is single wheel and the diff size is 10.50 just replacing seal thats all is there a torque spec for the nut...thx

 

Wacth out you dont put to much preload on the pinnon bearing or you start having pinnon problems, trust me on this one.

 

Well the preload should have been measured before taking it apart.
If a new crush slieve wasn't used in the reinstall.

Or another trick is to hold the flange and measure how much torque the old nut comes off at or starts to turn.

There is no set Torque for the flange nut.But you need to get the pinion bearing preload anywhere between 8 to 14 inch/lbs .This is done with no brake drag and wheels off.

This why I said above if you knew what the nut broke loose at when taking it apart.
It makes this whole thing easier .

Rich

 

Not to cause hate and discontent.

But you should never use a tourqe wrench to take off a nut or bolt it will not give you the correct value the nut has thread lock on it if it's rusted ect, And this will put you'r tourqe wrench out of cailrabation it was not made for this.

If some one used my high $$$$ Snap On tourqe wrench for removing bolts I be more than mad and I would have them pay to get the tool recalirabted.

When you have some type of part thats needs to be tourqed you want it to be right there a reason for it to be tourqed.

I work on aircraft for a living it has to be right or you could kill pepole it has to be right you can't pull over at the next curb it has to be right.

If you have a junk pointer type tourqe wrench they are not very good in the first place I would not use one of them on a CHEV but if I was going to use one to remove nuts to try to check tourqe thats the one I would use it going to give you a bad reading anyways.

My understanding the carrior also needs to be removed to get the correct pinnon preload the ring gear adds drag you need to check preload with carrior out of the housing.

I did a Dana 44, 10 years ago for gear change it worked fine.

I did my Ford 10.5 Sterling could not get it right I took it to a off road race shop that what they do is rear ends they been it at least 10 times now and they can not fix it 3 sets of gears 4 sets of bearings now there going to put a complete new rear end the truck.

I sure glad I payed to get the rear end done by someone else this is there problem to get it right they have lost lots of money and time on my truck.

But at least it's not right you can make them fix it if you spin a bearing or anything they touched they have to fix it.

 

well thx guys for all the input...first of all i didnt take nut off with the tourque wrench..only used it for tightning the nut...was told to put between 16 to 29 lbs....so i set it at 21.......i quess it wont take long to seize up....or make 1 hell of a racket if it aint right....thx again guys

 

well after doing some thinking what u guys have said i think i am going to slack the nut off a wee bit......u guys know how to give a guy gey hairs.... i know when i took it off it wasnt tite at all.... it isnt tite now either,,like i said i set it at 21 ft lbs...think i am going to turn on the shop lites and slack it off and tighten to mabe 19ft lbs....i know i had an old 77 ford 4x4 (the good ol trucks) and did the same process and everything was fine....what makes these new ones any differant....thx Mike

 

Powerstroke.... like Forty says, there is no set torque for the pinion nut, only a pinion bearing preload that is VERY important. Too tight, it can kill the pinion bearing, too loose, it can allow the pinion to move back and forth slightly on acceleration/deceleration, until it either kicks the nut off or kills the gearset, or both.

Tim
p.s. Marvo2.... I have a total of 7 Snap-On Torque Wrenches in 1/2, 3/8 and 1/4 drives, two of them are clearly marked: << Torques >> They torque bidirectionally, and have a selector on the ratchet head for left or right hand thread torquing, or in the case of some old school guys, detorquing.

 

thx SoCalSuperDuty. u know when i took the nut off it wasnt that tite so when i torqued it the first time i took my rachet and it felt very close to how it felt when i first removed it......so like i said i set it at 21 and think i will lv it there and c how she goes....is there any warning signs i could listen for now that u guys have made me parinoid,,,just kidding....i really appreciate the input.....Mike

 

After reading ALL the post I will tell you a unplesant truth. There is NO way to set up a pinion by the described methods. Ford dealerships don't even do it right when the do a simple pinion seal change. Why? well the answer is that to do it right you have to tear down the differential and set up the pinion on its own, might as well use a new crush sleeve when you do that. That would be a lot more costly, in the 1000 buck range, repair. And, most dealerships SAY they have someone that can set up a differential but they don't so they compromise. 106

 

Well pinion seal is in and so far so good...hit the freeway for a run and see what happens tomorrow...i did it the way i figured it should b done just wasnt sure on tourge spec...u guys had me worried for awhile from all the input but i think(and hope)things will b fine. tues i have a 1600 km road trip to do ,,thx again guys for all the input.... i hope my next post aint saying help...lol

 

With used tapered pinion bearings vs how high the preload was when new allowing for bearing wear your ok as your only 10% higher in torque numbers of 21 vs 19 ft/lbs. I would of cleaned the threads with brake clean or a carb cleaner and added Loctite. You can add Loctite 290 to assembled parts, it's designed to penetrate provided the threads are oil free.
Do you think a dealer would have worries or care when they assemble with a impact gun?
......=o&o>.....

 

one thing i forgot to mentoin when wheels were off the ground and i was spinning tires from forward to reverse by hand i noticed a very little bit of play in pinion i mean it was very little.....wondering if i should tighten nut a little more..???????? thx guys

 

Depends on how much there is, you should have some play in the set at the wheels. That is really determined by the ring and pinion backlash and ring and pinion engagement ( it all works together ) if I read your post right you didn't open it up to check. Now you are into the heart of the problem with just retorquing a pinion nut to install a seal. The ONLY way I will do it is to either pull the gear set and set up the pinion on a new crush sleeve and pull it down to spec or this way. Pull the axles out about 6 inches, measure the torque that it take to rotate the gear set at the pinion nut. Remove the nut and throw it away, put a new seal in, use a new nut and torque it back to what it was plus or minus 2-5 in lbs. That is tighten it back up until it takes the same torque as original to rotate the set. With a 10.5 it takes around 350 -400 lbs of torque on the nut using a new crush sleeve to get the set down to where it goes in in/lbs to rotate the set. There is no way to do it by just the torque on the nut, it is the rotation torque that is important. Nuts vary and the self locking threads don't all work the same and sure don't work the same once you take it off and put it back on. That is a compromise set up anyway. Like I posted the ONLY right way to do it is to pull the ring and pinion out and set up a new crush sleeve. Do most people, drive-line shops, dealers etc do that, nope. For many reasons principally they don't have anyone that CAN do it, customers don't want to pay 1000 bucks for a 14 buck seal. So they use a compromise procedure"; they just tighten or loosen and are left wondering if they need to tighten or loosen more, sound familiar? When you pull a new 10.5 pinion crush sleeve down sometimes plus or minus 5 degrees of turn will either under tighten or over tighten the pinion pre-load on the pinion bearings. That isn't much and there is no way that you can do it correctly guessing or like some ham handed mechanics SAY they can do it by sound with an impact. 106