archibaldtuttle

following up on a thread about a bad axle bearing that either resulted in or resulted from a slightly bent axle housing. While I might be looking for getting just an 8" housing, a lot of listings are for complete axles. I could swap the gears if it's 8" but no harm having a second set that matches the truck. in the field, if the the axle has been separated from it's original install I'll need to check the ratio with the turning test.

I have seen it generally reported as turn the wheel once counting the turns of the driveshaft and double the result (or turn the wheel twice and count driveshaft turns).

not sure why the ratio is double the result, assume maybe the slipping gear for the non turning wheel is taking up 1/2 the motion?

would this test work on an autolock limited slip? can you slow turn the one wheel without locking? would double the result hold? is there a simple in situ test to identify non-electric limited slip? different result if both wheels are free–locking or nonlocking?

By axle code B07A I've got non-locking 4.3 which coordinates with my double check turning test results of about 2 and 1/6 turn of driveshaft per turn of the wheel. I don't know that it would be problematic if I got a limited slip axle as long as the ratio is right. mine has ABS, but the sensors mount on the hub assembly and the hubs and axles are interchangeable into virtually any differential that fits, I believe.

I've got a slight bend in my axle housing that either resulted in or resulted from the bearing walking out of its mount on the highway (pretty exciting even though I realized bad things were happening before it completely parted company with the truck). I read about 1" of toe out front to rear at the outer dimension of 265/75 R16s (about 31.5" diameter according to charts and my tape measure). This is consistent with rotation so I put it down to bent housing, not bent axle. It also coordinates with the hub not itself not sitting paralellel to the axle housing prior to bolting down

This arrangement doesn't appear to be designed for any shimming to accommodate any minor deviance from parallel so it looks like that is enough out of parallel to recommended getting another axle. So I'm gonna to use straight edges on potential replacements to check for parallel front to rear and top to bottom. Should I expect spot on or within what range at what radius?

thanks for any thoughts.

brian

Jomoka

It's a manufactured item, so it's always going to have some deviation from perfection, but I think you'd want it to be pretty minimal. Like... less than 1/8" or so at the 31.5" wheel diameter? 1/16th is probably better, 1/8" is about as much as I think I'd want to accept. At some point you start affecting how the car handles in a transition from straight to a turn, you can certainly feel small changes in the front toe, I'd assume the rear would be as sensitive.