I have some humming/vibrations coming from the rear end in my 1993 22RE 4wd, so I decided to put her on stands and see what I could find. There seems to be a lot of lateral play at the companion flange. I have zero experience here, but my first thought was maybe the pinion bearing is shot? As well, does my rotational play seem to be okay?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2vP...ature=youtu.be

 

I do agree, that is very excessive play.

 

Drop the drive shaft, remove the nut and then the companion flange.
Install new seal, degrease pinion splines and companion flange.
Lock-tite spline area of companion flange and threaded end of pinion.
I torque the nut to 130-140fp, then stake nut and re-assemble. Flanges on t-case only need 90-95 fp.
I found all the flanges loose like this on my '87 runner when I got it with 273,000mi on the clock.
All still good and tight after 5,000 more miles and vibrations dissappeared.
Always a chance you do have a bad pinion bearing, but you have nothing to lose by trying to tighten your flange.

 

Rotational play does'nt seem excessive for worn parts, considering that the play includes the lost motion of the axle spline clearances and the spidergear to side gear clearances as well as ring and pinion backlash.

 

Thanks for the detailed reply millball. That was also my plan of action. Seeing as my pinion seal is already leaking, I figured tightening up the companion nut when replacing the seal was my best bet. Do you think 130lb-ft for the nut is possibly too much? I've noticed a general anxiety about the crush sleeves used in our diffs.

 

It is my experience that 130-140 fp is not enough to add additional crush.
I have torqued several different ones to these values and the measured preload did not increase as I increased the tightness, and they continued in satisfactory service.

 

After removing the companion flange, I found a crazy amount of up/down, in/out play in the pinion. I'm not sure if just the pinion bearing is shot or if the damage runs deeper. I think I might try to find a used third to swap in and maybe pull this one and do a rebuild. Here's another video:

 

I cannot see your video, but you cannot make any judgement by wiggling the pinion with no tension applied to it.
Put the flange back on and torque it.
Then lets see what you've got.

 

Okay, that does make sense seeing as the pinion nut sets tension to the pinion.

I took it all apart, had a hell of a time getting the new seal in, put the flange back on and tightened the nut 3/16 of a turn tighter than it was before. I believe it was between 110-120lb-ft. This was enough to take all the slack out of the flange, and I like to err on the side of caution anyways.

I guess time will tell if I fixed the leak. I'm still hearing noise from the rear, but it could be a number of things. Thanks for your help.

 

Please post back to this thread after you run her a while.
It is always helpful to know whether a fix holds up or if other measures have to be taken.

 

Quick update. I ran the re-tightened pinion flange for a few months without issue. Additional torque to the pinion nut didn't seem to affect the crush sleeve. It seems as though the pinion nuts can readily handle 130 lb-ft as millball suggested. I've since replaced my stock 4.10 diffs with 4.56 units.

Best of luck y'all, and don't be scared to torque down those nuts!

 

Appreciate the update. Happy New Year!!