Pinion pre laod?
Thread Starter
Teching In
Joined: Aug 2005
Posts: 4
Likes: 0
From: New York
Pinion pre laod? For some reason I can't grasp how to set the pre load on the pinion bearing. How do you set it to spec? and then how hard do you do the final tighten? This is driving me crazy.
your best bet is to leave the crush washer and pinion seal out till you get your pinion depth and backlash set so that your pattern looks good, then take every thing back apart and add the crush washer and pinion seal to your pinion
you will need a good 1/2 drive impact gun to tighten the pinion nut and crush the washer, take it slow, it is a 1 time deal, if you tighten the pinion/crush washer too much you have to start over with another new crush washer
you will feel the pinion tighten till it gets to the crush washer, then the nut will be very tight and it will almost seem like the pinion nut wont tighten anymore, keep going in short blast's with the impact as you also spin the pinion with your other hand, stoping every other blast to see if the pinion has any drag on it yet, when you feel some drag, stop and get your inch pound torque dial out and spin the pinion with it, with new pinion bearing you want it to be from 20-30 inch pounds, with used bearings 10-15 inch pounds
tighten till you get the spec you need
you will need a good 1/2 drive impact gun to tighten the pinion nut and crush the washer, take it slow, it is a 1 time deal, if you tighten the pinion/crush washer too much you have to start over with another new crush washer
you will feel the pinion tighten till it gets to the crush washer, then the nut will be very tight and it will almost seem like the pinion nut wont tighten anymore, keep going in short blast's with the impact as you also spin the pinion with your other hand, stoping every other blast to see if the pinion has any drag on it yet, when you feel some drag, stop and get your inch pound torque dial out and spin the pinion with it, with new pinion bearing you want it to be from 20-30 inch pounds, with used bearings 10-15 inch pounds
tighten till you get the spec you need
On The Tree
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 124
Likes: 0
Be very very careful with the impact. Most of the aftermarket crush washers compress much easier than the factory ones. The first one I did I was going gungho with my 1/2" impact thinking it would take alot of hammering to crush the washer. Well, the pinion got real tight real quick and I had to use my spare crush washer.
My advice is........slowly tighten the pinion nut until almost all the slack is taken up out of pinion (it doesn't flop around anymore). Then, going very slowly and a little at a time, tighten the nut until you get 25-35 inch/lbs of rotating torque on the pinion for new bearings and 15-20 inch/lbs on used bearings. These readings are taken without the carrier installed or the pinion seal.
Using a beam style torque wrench to measure pinion preload is almost impossible with the diff in the car because the exhaust and torque arm get in the way. This is where it's nice to have an experienced hand around to set the preload by feel.
My advice is........slowly tighten the pinion nut until almost all the slack is taken up out of pinion (it doesn't flop around anymore). Then, going very slowly and a little at a time, tighten the nut until you get 25-35 inch/lbs of rotating torque on the pinion for new bearings and 15-20 inch/lbs on used bearings. These readings are taken without the carrier installed or the pinion seal.
Using a beam style torque wrench to measure pinion preload is almost impossible with the diff in the car because the exhaust and torque arm get in the way. This is where it's nice to have an experienced hand around to set the preload by feel.
