Superflexy install, diff drop and preservation

[Marlin]

Why, you live in friggin' South Carolina for chrissakes...
We are under a Winter Weather Advisory today, 3-4 inches of snow tonight and hopefully not much freezing rain before the snow.

This time last year I spent 3 or 4 days hanging christmas lights, I was wearing coat, gloves, hat, freezing my *** off. Definitely too warm for this time of year.
Anyway why would you clean all the grease out of your CV joints? Are you just trying to make work for yourself?

I cleaned the grease out since I had all torn boots, and I wheeled with em that way at uwharrie. I am sure there was dirt and whatnot. The solvent based parts cleaner is free to use on base Grease is cheap, CVs are not.

You didn't show a pic of the inside of the brackets. Did you grind all of the weld lines flat in there? The axle flange needs to seat flat against the bracket.

I did grind all the welds flat on the inside face. Hopefully its actually flat and gets a good seal. Isn't the axle seal the actual fluid sealing surface? Maybe I will put some RTV along the seating surface as well just in case the axle seal leaks.

I just borrowed Halo Reach from a friend at work,its very hard to decide to work on the truck right now...

[tom4bren]

[COLOR="Red"]I did grind all the welds flat on the inside face. Hopefully its actually flat and gets a good seal. Isn't the axle seal the actual fluid sealing surface? Maybe I will put some RTV along the seating surface as well just in case the axle seal leaks.

Yes, the axle seal is what controls the fluid retention. There's no need for RTV (other than peace of mind). The flat surface isn't hyper critical, just good sense.

[Marlin]

Yes, the axle seal is what controls the fluid retention. There's no need for RTV (other than peace of mind). The flat surface isn't hyper critical, just good sense.

Gotcha, that is what I was thinking, I think I will RTV it anyway. Its already apart and I have a ton of RTV from the locker install.

[Marlin]

Since Halo reach sucked, which took me 3 hours of playing to figure out I decided to drop the axle this morning. Not so bad, I even got it out without taking the steering linkage apart. Putting it back in, thats a whole new story...

I used the HF soda blaster to blast the whole thing down. Best toy ever!!!! Worked like a champ. Took about 15lbs of baking soda to get it cleaned up. 10 years worth of grime, dirt, grease, rust, gone in about 15 minutes or so. I should be able to start painting in about 20 minutes. I know it still looks rusty, but POR15 has to have rust on it to set properly. I had the blaster set to stun, or rather lowest concentration of media I also have the cleanest driveway on the block now. It is 100% environmentally friendly, so I just dragged it down by the curb and went to town.

[Ldub]

It's fun to stay at the...wait for it...



Y - M- - A

Back on topic...

Nice job...

[Marlin]

It's fun to stay at the...wait for it...



Y - M- - A

Back on topic...

Nice job...

Nice! I spent the better part of the last hour looking for my cans of POR15. The wife had been threatening to throw them away if I didn't put them up for the last several months. She is at work, so I can't ask. I finally gave up and used high temp engine primer to primer the damn thing. While that was drying, I went ahead and removed the passenger side axle and installed the new bracket.
Put the first coat of red on, letting it dry now. Then I will go ahead and mount up the passenger side. While the second coat is drying, I will yank the driver's side out...not the fun one. Its a PITA to get the axle bearing off. I also have to make sure I don't damage the axle seal, those things are like 40 bucks IIRC from replacing em when I did the locker install.

[Marlin]

After looking at the pics, I noticed how bad the oil pan looked, so I went ahead and treated that with rust neutralizer, and I will paint it as I go along. My poor old girl looks horrible. most of it is mud, but damn, its pathetic.