84 Crewcab...AKA..Patches

if your not against it...pulling up the carpet or mat, you can use a cheryr picker to do it thru the transfercase tunnel..bonus is that trans an tcase togethe pretty much balance themselves so you can even leave them mounted to the cross brace

i dont fondly remember bench pressing my fresh rebuilt iron 203 up into my ramcharger..i bruised some ribs
 
I did make a removable tunnel assembly and had the interior and carpet up and out. I never thought of the cherry picker through the tunnel opening....Hmmm might give that a try next time and see how it works, Thanks for the idea!(y)
 
its such an awkward and HEAVY assy that i couldnt find any other "safe" way to do it as an assy short of making a dedicated rig for lifting
 
So I've been having some noise coming from the rear diff for a while now, and the other night when bringing home the W350 clubcab on the trailer it would make a nasty grinding/chattering noise when turning around corners. I've always run gear oil with LSD additive and then toss in a bit extra if I felt any chatter in the clutches after driving for a few days, but this is not the normal clutch chatter I don't think.

I just changed out the fluid a few weeks ago because of this and there was nothing internally that caught my eye in the oil or bottom of the case. No noises when I rotate the drive shaft forward or reverse, hubs seem fine with no excessive end play and during my heavy hauling I checked the temps regularly and they were all within 5-10degrees of each other.


Wondering if the clutches in my power-loc have just worn out and is now metal on metal contact...that is kind of what it feels like? I had the power-loc rebuilt when I had the diffs changed over from 4.10's to 3.54's so they have about 180K km's on them, but a lot of heavy hauling miles in there as well.
 
Well I just popped the cover off and boy was I surprised at what drained out....
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Looks milky and pea soup green!!
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I only put this fluid in less than a month ago after draining out the synthetic 75W90 winter gear oil I run from October to May, been doing this summer/winter fluid swap for a few years now with no issues. The winter gear oil drained out nice and clean with no visible issues then refilled with this Fluid, it's 75W140 that I ran for only a couple months last summer then drained, filtered and put in a sealed container.

Truck has sat for almost 48 hours so it shouldn't have any frothing in the oil from air, and there shouldn't be any water in the axle since I did a new pinion seal last year and the axle seals are still good. Any ideas what could have caused this?
 
that sure looks like moisture....dump it all in a water jug or leave a stick in it for 48 hours and see if 1 end comes out wet
 
so you got me wondering and since im haaving a dental day...ive got time to google about

seems to be alot of debate on dyno vs synth but it gets even more heated in the "gear oil"...but i found a solid read..seems synth gear oil mixes with moisture FASTER and stays mixed easier with synth among other things...also found in my searches was that adding additives boosts its ability to take on water...

you stated you swap summer vs winter..any possibility it picked up moisture in storage?

 
I decided last week to dive in and re/re the Power-Loc. Found a local HD commercial driveline shop that had the genuine Spicer rebuild kit in stock for cheaper than the knock off kits+shipping that I could find on-line....so that was a big bonus!

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Never done this job before but read through my FSM and watched a couple vids on-line and felt pretty confident. Getting the carrier out was really not that hard, just mark your bearing caps so they go back in exactly as they came out...couple paint parks on each, then a couple small bars to pry it loose and catch it on an old blanket and cardboard, then onto the bench.

Pulling it apart was easy enough....I didn't snap a pic but I used a couple pieces of wood and a ratchet strap to hold the carrier against my bench top vise so I could crack the case bolts loose.

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Found the source for my grinding noise...steels had started eating into the clutch discs....

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According to the drive line shop you can't run Synthetic fluid in these diffs with these modern power-loc kits in them since it causes the friction materials to turn to goo, but my power-loc had been rebuilt 10 years ago and he thinks it may have been an older kit since they seemed to have held up better to the synthetic fluid I've been using over the winter the last coupe years. He said 80W90 SAE/Hypoid gear oil only with 2 bottles of friction modifier.
 
You have to soak the new clutches for at least 20 min in friction modifier before install, and there are 4 "thin" disc and 2 thick. The thin ones had it marked on the disc material but after soaking it had dissolved away, thankfully the two thick ones had different markings and they had not disappeared so was able to figure out which disc were which. To do it again a small paint mark or scratch on the side tabs on the thin discs would have been helpful.

Then it was just install them in the right sequence...thin clutch disc, steel, thin, steel, thick clutch disc, align cone and side gear with splines and done one side...same on other side then put two halves back together and tighten everything up. Again strapped to the vise with some wood and ratchet strap.

Then wrestle the carrier back in the housing, couple bars and a few taps from the rubber and dead blow hammer and it slid right back into place.

Refilled with 80W90 and the friction modifier and for a couple days it was a little rough...think everything was just settling in...now it's smooth as silk!
 
I did inspect the side bearings and after almost 180K km's they were starting to get worn so I think I will have to do a full rebuild sooner than later.
 
I did find the source for the water in my diff fluid though while I was doing this job!

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It has been cracked for some time but my guess is when I drove down to the coast with the Coronet on the trailer it sank the suspension just enough to open the crack and allow the water from the couple rain storms I drove through to run down and into the diff. So new hose and some silicone on and around the fittings and should be sealed up nice and tight!
 
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