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Front diff. removal

crane operator

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The guys tried to remove the front diff. out of the old ford tandem winch truck friday. Says its stuck and won't move . I went and fiddled with it yesterday afternoon for a little while, I've got it about 3/4" out and doesn't seem to want to come any further.

Early 80's ford 9000. Eaton rears. Something wrong in the Front diff, so it needs to come out.

I've usually left the shaft in, that goes to the rear diff. and just slid the whole works off the shaft. I'm wondering if I'm going to have to go back and pull rear yoke and get that shaft out on this one. It seems that's holding me up.

Pull rear shaft or not?
 

Mike L

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Does it have a locker? I remember an older mechanic telling me that on some rear ends with lockers that you need to remove the locker line and insert a 3/8” bolt to hold something? Up. I never ran into it but I have had rear ends that exploded and I had to cut it out with a torch. Do you have a borescope or camera that you could slide in the 3/4” gap and take a peek?
 

Mike L

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Now I remember- the bolt holds over the arm that engages the locker which will allow the diff through the hole.
 

crane operator

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Yes it does have front to rear locker, not cross axle locks. I've never used a bolt to hold over the arm. I'll investigate the locker arm a little better before we go further. Thanks.
 

funwithfuel

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Or put shop air to it to lock it in place. but are you talking about the inter-lock. If it has 402's in it you will have to remove the rear out put yoke.
Agreed, all others slip off the through shaft, when I was younger , I fought for a solid day on one till an older fella walked by, shook his head and chuckled. He then shared his sage wisdom. "I did the same thing last week, you gotta pull the rear yoke and carrier":D
 

Jonas302

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Yes yoke has to come off ran into that not long ago on a 402 output shaft goes with the diff
 

Truck Shop

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The fact that it's a Ford 9000 it has a good chance that the drives are Eaton 402 P's. You will have to change the out put shaft yoke seal so while your there remove the snap ring that
retains the thru-shaft support bearing and remove the bearing. After installing the center drive unit then install the bearing and snap ring. It will make the installation easy.
 
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crane operator

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Well I feel kinda stupid. Really a lot stupid. Had one of my guys pull the rear yoke, and one of the other operators got back to the shop early and they got the diff pulled. Mechanic called me, thinks the damage is in the spider gears, or front nose, because no other obvious damage.

20191008_192308.jpg

I get back to the shop that night, roll it over and look at it, and its in like perfect condition. My experience is if there is enough damage to make noise, there's a lot of damage, so I don't tear it apart any further.

What the?

Truck had gone to jobsite loaded. Driver said something "popped". Mechanic there and walked beside it while "popping" obvious noise coming from front axle drivers side. Limped it in beside the crane, unloaded the counterweight. Mechanic pulls axles in parking lot, they are both fine. Stuff rags in the axles, limp it to the shop, no noise at all, with the axles out driving it back to shop with no weight on it. They get it to the shop, and start pulling diff. Diff is now on the shop floor and the Diff is fine.

So the Diff is laying on the floor, right beside the truck, and the lightbulb (its usually pretty dim) goes off in my head. I've heard that sound before when driving, and I knew what it was instantly, and wished I'd done some diagnosis myself before they pulled the diff.

Dayton wheels, just had a flat the week before. Yep- Loose rims on the wheel. "Popping" sound was the rim walking around on the wedges. I've had it happen to me once 20 years ago, and you could see right on the rim where it had walked on the wedges loaded. With the weight off, not enough resistance to make it pop, axles in or no axles in.

So the diff is back in now, new wedges and studs, and a good tightening, and its back on the road. Thanks for all the help guys.
 

funwithfuel

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Well I feel kinda stupid. Really a lot stupid. Had one of my guys pull the rear yoke, and one of the other operators got back to the shop early and they got the diff pulled. Mechanic called me, thinks the damage is in the spider gears, or front nose, because no other obvious damage.

View attachment 203509

I get back to the shop that night, roll it over and look at it, and its in like perfect condition. My experience is if there is enough damage to make noise, there's a lot of damage, so I don't tear it apart any further.

What the?

Truck had gone to jobsite loaded. Driver said something "popped". Mechanic there and walked beside it while "popping" obvious noise coming from front axle drivers side. Limped it in beside the crane, unloaded the counterweight. Mechanic pulls axles in parking lot, they are both fine. Stuff rags in the axles, limp it to the shop, no noise at all, with the axles out driving it back to shop with no weight on it. They get it to the shop, and start pulling diff. Diff is now on the shop floor and the Diff is fine.

So the Diff is laying on the floor, right beside the truck, and the lightbulb (its usually pretty dim) goes off in my head. I've heard that sound before when driving, and I knew what it was instantly, and wished I'd done some diagnosis myself before they pulled the diff.

Dayton wheels, just had a flat the week before. Yep- Loose rims on the wheel. "Popping" sound was the rim walking around on the wedges. I've had it happen to me once 20 years ago, and you could see right on the rim where it had walked on the wedges loaded. With the weight off, not enough resistance to make it pop, axles in or no axles in.

So the diff is back in now, new wedges and studs, and a good tightening, and its back on the road. Thanks for all the help guys.
On one hand, that sucks:(, on the other, you didn't have to buy a screw:). At least you caught it before someone tore it down completely to find nothing.
 

Truck Shop

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Well you did learn something about pulling a Eaton 402 so in a small way you know the front drive is in good shape. The Eaton 404 front drive the thru shaft stays in the housing and the
same for Rockwell 40-145's. But other than some oil and sealer your not out much other the the in house labor.

But on the other hand what do you think would have happened had you taken it to a shop-the possibility of a reman drive then they find the mag wheels were loose and never say a word.
 

Tenwheeler

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Glad you got that worked out but I would not normally share stuff like that.
Before the internet I worked for a company that hired mister know it all. He was my new boss and I was young. Drove the truck and explained the situation. Oh: That's the front drive. I pulled it out but found nothing wrong. Oh: That's the rear drive. Pulled it out and saw nothing wrong. Oh: That is the transmission pull it out.
I had lost belief and knocked the top off. That was easy as it was an Astro. It had teeth broken off gears.
Before pulling units with major noise check and see what metal is in them.
Almost went into the back of a 1066 IHC for the same wedge reason. Sometimes sitting back for awhile or looking at it again tomorrow can save a lot of money.
 

crane operator

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Glad you got that worked out but I would not normally share stuff like that.
I mess up all the time, and I wish I was a better mechanic than what I am, I just try to muddle along.

But other than some oil and sealer your not out much other the the in house labor.

But on the other hand what do you think would have happened had you taken it to a shop-the possibility of a reman drive then they find the mag wheels were loose and never say a word.

I feel really fortunate, I have some good guys that work for me and they aren't afraid to dive in and try to fix something. At least if we fix it here, we know what we've done.

The equipment feeds us, so we have to try to take care of it. I sure appreciate all the help guys give out here also. There's always someone who's been there before. Thanks again everyone.


On one hand, that sucks:(, on the other, you didn't have to buy a screw:). At least you caught it before someone tore it down completely to find nothing.

The next morning it was headed to the gear shop, I get kind of distracted by the crane work, and its hard sometimes to sit back and rethink things. I usually just want it fixed and full speed ahead. And that's not always a good plan. Win some and lose some, I'd actually consider this one a win. Like truckshop said, really all we are out is a little time, and we know what the real problem was and its now fixed. I'll take that any day over a problem that comes and goes, and you end up chasing your tail trying to find it and then to fix it.
 

kshansen

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Like truckshop said, really all we are out is a little time, and we know what the real problem was and its now fixed. I'll take that any day over a problem that comes and goes, and you end up chasing your tail trying to find it and then to fix it.

At least you were smart enough to try to find the problem. I've worked around too many who will just ignore those strange noises and keep on trucking! Then when it finally blows up and you are deep in tearing it apart some SOB will come along and say "I wondered why it was making that noise for the last two months, but it stopped leaving a puddle of oil so I figured it was just over full!"
 

CM1995

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Running what I brung and taking what I win
My old grandfather always said that a man who never made a mistake in his life never made anything.........

My Father would say If you don't screw up something every now and then, you're not doing anything in life.
 
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