Mountain Cop

You are getting a lot more done on yours than I am on mine! Would you mind shooting some side shots of your pinion angle as it hangs (simulating droop condition) and again as it sits once you get the rubber on? I'm still trying to figure out where to place my frame tubes to make mine aim where I need it to.

77RogueRunner

Here is a pic of my front driveshaft..not good. I do have the smaller V6 version, clearanced for angle, but it wasn't that bad before....



I had a feeling that would be an issue. I really don't want to run it this way unless I have to cause it will mess up my splines. I had in the back of my mind a hi-pinion 3rd in the near future so I might hold-off doing anything as far as driveline stuff right now (it'll probably still need to lengthened a bit). If I can't score a 3rd I'll have a d/l built, it will undoubtedly need hi-angle joints though.

Mountain Cop, here are some angles, won't get droop again for a bit, will post when I do....

Pinion, it looks off kilter but that's how I was holding the camera, the #'s are true...



Driveline, gauge hanging from bottom...


Here is front stance with 265/75r16's, inner hood clearancing courtesy of the 5MGE....



Side stance, you can see the front isn't really raked up compared to the back, but that fender gap is a little too much for me, that's where the 35's will come in. If that front fender looks a little off in color, it's actually rattle can'd. Duplicolor "Perfect Match" BTY1557, 138 factory color code...looks better than my decades old paint....



While I was under my rig taking these pics and looking at my front driveline, something occured to me. It might be genuis, or it could be a disaster. Going to take some time out to "experiment"...

Mountain Cop

Thanks for the pics! The pinion angle thing is something I've been thinking about a lot too. I'm wondering if mounting my frame tubes higher and using longer shackles might be helpful, in that it would reduce vertical movement of the rear spring eye while cycling through the arc of the shackle by increasing the radius. I could then keep the spring closer to the frame without it hitting the frame. Hopefully, by moving my axle forward a bit, I will have helped eliminate some of the ability of the U-joint to bind.

More importantly, what is this invention that you speak of?

77RogueRunner

Mountain Cop since I've got your curiousity, I'll digress. It's not an invention, just another way of looking at something. This may have been discussed somewhere else, and I do seach, but if it's not in the first 10 pullings in Google with my discriminating keywords or in YotaTech, then I'll ask or comment. Now to go off on a tangent (this may deserve a thread of it's own). So I was talking about wanting a hi-pinion someday. Remembered TG had the housing's for sale for 250, now they're 279 (must be the unrest in the middle east ). So 279, plus any parts, plus set-up which I don't know how to do or have the right tools. Went back out and started looking at the bolt pattern on the diff. Took some measurements. I'll be darned if every opposing set of cooresponsing bolts had the same measurement, ie...you could possibly rotate the housing 180 and have the same pattern. This tells me that it *might* be possible to fit one of these upside down, thus making it a hi-pinion. It won't be as strong casue it's on the coast side, but that's how it is anyway. Several conditions MUST be true for this to work. These are those conditions:

The bolt pattern has to line up at 180*;
The 3rd side bearings must be equal distances from the edge so the proper axle spline location is realized in the 3rd;
The 3rd side bearings must be center of housing up and down which will allow it to be center again when rotated.

The conditions I can alter are as follows:

I have to re-notch the housing for the ring;
The front of the housing will also have to be rotated 180* for ring clearance.

I was looking at the front of the housing and it looks like Toyota (love those engineers) took roughly 2 halves and welded them together for the main housing. They then basically took the bowl shaped front of the housing and welded it to the flats of the two halves. This can bee see as a "return" when you pull your front diff. If that is the case, I can grind the welds off (you can see the difference in elevation), remove the "bowl", flip it 180, and re-weld it. The fill plug will be at the same plane so that won't be an issue. At that point the only thing I'd need to do is install a HP oil slinger and I should be good.
Here's what I need, if anyone is willing. To verify this stuff I need somebody to try to put a bare (can't have the ring installed due to the front housing clearance) 3rd in upside-down. Also, it'd need the side bearing measured from center, top to bottom......and side of bearings to outside of flange to verify they are the same numbers. Just looking at the diff side pics on the TG site the bearings look darn near center top to bottom. I've contemplated posting some of this info in the pre 86 forums, but I honestly think this crowd sees these going in and out the housings more. Soooo, genius or crazy....deserving of it's own thread? Feedback is appreciated....D

Mountain Cop

K. I'm still intrigued. New ideas are always worth exploring.

As far as the bowl of the axle housing, it might be easier to get an 8" (IIRC) pipe cap and replace the old bowl with it entirely. Dbcfr used one for diff armor in the rear, but I've been contemplating using it for the entire piece.

Mountain Cop

This might be of interest: http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=45528
http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=951286

Basically, it doesn't look like it will work.

77RogueRunner

Good threads Mountain Cop. My questions may have been answered in those. The second thread was talking about swapping the HP gears into the upside-down v6, which was not really what I was thinking anyway as I'm trying not to touch the gear setup. It did contain this quote which was in response to something the OP stated...

"No need. Take a standard diff and rotate 180, and put it in front. Done. HP goodness."

That's what I was looking for!

I'm not really too concerened about riding on the coast side, that's how Toyota designed it in the pick-up's and Runner pre 86 for the front with the 8" interchangeablilty. I think the HP reverse cut was mainly designed for strength and longevity becasue it was for a larger, heavier, full-time 4wd rig, whereas the "selectable" 4wd's only used 4 wheel when needed and could sacrifice the strength for the occasional usage. Of course, there's no sub for a real Toyota HP diff with the r/c gears, just really hard to find around here...

Mountain Cop

Knowing pirate, that quote was sarcastic.

It will not work. By rotating the diff 180 degrees, you place the ring gear on the opposite side of the pinion, but the pinion still rotates the same way. That means that the pinion will be turning the "front" side of the ring the opposite way (5 speeds in reverse, one forward).

Try this. Hold a pencil parallel to your table. Hold a quarter on its edge on the table, such that the face is touching one side of the eraser (simulating the ring and pinion). Note which way it rotates. Now, put the quarter on the other side of the eraser. It will rotate the other way. The way that the ring rotates determines the direction that the tires rotate.

It would only work if you swap both the front AND the back, and somehow figured out how to change the rotation of the drive shafts or transmission output shaft. IMO, not worth it.

77RogueRunner

That makes more sense, the way you described it. So I was crazy!! Oh well, guess I have to hold out for a real hp....

77RogueRunner

Had to lift the rear a bit to level out the rig. Took the middle leaf of the original fronts I had and stuffed them under the 2 main leafs of the rear...



Original pack "wrap"..



Cherried and opened...



Leaf stuffed, using 1/4 plate to hammer the wrap tight to that, then knocked the plate out to give it factory wiggle room...






I'll post some flex pics when I get a chance and summarize the build into a few simple steps for anyone wanting to do the same thing....D

77RogueRunner

Before I roaded the new setup, I decided to take out my add-a-leafs in the rear, the ride suffered terribly from those. Took the smallest leaf out of the TG pack, and cut the middle leaf from the front. This put me back up where I needed to be and greatly helped the ride in the back.....



The front feels WAY better than my last setup. It's stiff and responsive, but not overly stiff like my last setup. It gives, but put's you right back at ride height, no sponge, hi-speed cornering feels safer than before. It feels more like my pop's SFA Powerstroke, still not IFS cush, but somewhere between. It may be the abundance of leafs in the front making the ride smooth. The steering feels real good, good road feedback, also I like the fact the steering rods are parallel to each other at ride height, I just think it's better geometry. Despite all that, some things did happen that I'm not too happy about...you be the judge. These leafs settled way more than I thought, and one settled more than the other, all in the course of about 30 miles of hi-way (hi-speed)/ gravel road with washboard and pothole driving (low speed). I had about 1 inch of gangsta lean on the pass side. I had to take out the spacer on the d/s perch and replaced it with a 1/8". There is now 1/2" lean to the pass side (43 3/4" to p/s fender vs. 44 1/4" d/s. When this 200lb bag of meat sits in the driver's seat it is perfectly level. The greater angle on the p/s is the cause of the lean....that spring flattened itself 1/4" more in length. The zerk location relative to the inspection hole is deceptive, it is the location of the hole that is actually off, center to center, both sides are within 1/32"......

p/s, ~43*.......



d/s....~37*



Again, when I sit in the seat the rig goes level and both angles are at 40*. I was hoping for less of an angle, but the more I think about it, it might be okay. I re-pulled my #'s and all the conditions I planned out will still be met. These angles will go to slightly over 50 then the bump is engaged.....the shackles will still be 1/2" from the frame and as far as I can tell and there will never be shackle to frame contact. This angle also gives me more progressive up-travel for a better stuff and overall lower ride, but maybe too much droop. I'll give it some more time and see how it goes with the springs settling, that was the X-factor I was hoping would go my way, but.......






Here is my front driveshaft lengthened by me. If I didn't had a crapload of DOM and gas prices didn't suck right now I'd take it to a pro. This should be close to where is needs to be for the stock stuff. The zip-tie is my travel indicator. You can see it moved forward almost 1" horizontally which tells me these springs are almost going flat just in the course of normal driving, good thing I got HD's. For anybody who cares, this is a clearanced 3.0 V6 shaft lengthened to 7 1/2" to the outside of each flange you press the DOM tube onto....



Action pics next......