Winter and New Year 07/08

December 26, 2007

After much worry and procrastinating, I started again working on my ten-bolt differential.

I put the dial indicator on to check the backlash before I started. Bad news, it seems the backlash measured at 0.0325 which is .0235 over tolerance.

Next, I took out the axles and found they had major wear groves where the bearing rode making them junk. I will have to replace them with new ones.

I thought taking out the open case would be a problem but is fell out on its own and cut my drop cord in two. One less problem I had to deal with then only to step into a bigger one.

The axle bearing is stuck in big time. I tried to slide hammer it out with no success. It made me mad and I quit for the day.

December 27, 2007

I bought a used GM posi unit from a friend I don't talk to anymore a year or so ago. I counted the splines, 28 like I use in my 10 bolt 7.625". But, the bearing inside diameter is 1 and 3/8" where as my axles are 1 and 3/16" at the end. It's too big!

What did I buy? I just knew 28 splines, I didn't think to measure ID diameter.

I guess live and learn

December 28, 2007

I'm such an idiot! The posi unit's box says 8.5 30 spline on the box part number GM 26010481. In my defence the print was faded and hard to read but it there was none the less.

On the bright side, I now know what to list it as on eBay.

I was able to remove yesterdays unremovable axle bearings using a trick from one of the guys on Chevy Talk. I took out the roller bearings thus only having the races stuck. Then I took my MIG welder and welded a bead 360 degrees around inside the race. This warped the race enough to allow my make shift slide hammer work allowing me to remove the blessed bearing.

January 15, 2008

I have been battling a motivation problem the last few weeks. I ordered a posi unit and axles that I needed on eBay. I hope the parts all work. The Dallas Cowboys have been winning again and since I am a fair weather Cowboy fan I have taken a renewed interest in watching football. Therefore, instead of working on the 57 I have been sitting in front of the tube-watching millionaires knock each other down.

However, the last 2 days I have put in 3 hours of work after work. Everything has to be hard and taking the bearing off the old posi unit was no exception. I had to use the MIG welder to get them off and custom usage of my pullers. I also got the ring gear off the old open unit.

January 19, 2008

It looks like the web page has changed to a new format this week. This will be the third rendition. The new format prompted my to revisited my 30 page web site. My journey of my quest to restore, maintain, repair, update my 57 is now going on over 7 years now. My mechanic skills, which are far from being exceptional, have grown to where I do not tear up as much, hurt myself as often, or have to redo already completed tasks. I have learned a great deal studying how to do my projects. I envy the guy who restores his car in 6 months. How do they do that? When I started, I used to read how guys took 10 years to build a car I use to think, how did it take them so long? I may never finish.

Today I took my posi unit to work. Once there I used our 25 ton press to press on the bearings.

I looked up my cylinder heads today on Mortec.com. I have 333882 number heads. Motec told me they were made during years 74-80, used on 350/400 cubic inch engines, has 76cc chambers, 1.94 intake and 1.5 exhaust.

January 19, 2008

Saturday DACC meet at the Frosty Drive In located in Denton, Texas for lunch. Frosty is a 50's survivor that opened for business in 1954 and was remodeled to its present look in 1964. Frosty is known for being a real old-fashioned drive inn with homemade root beer that's still hugely popular with locals.

There was a large turn out of long time members with a surprisingly large group of new guys.

I drove my Chrysler 300 since my ���57 is under a rear end update.

January 25, 2008

Doing a little bench racing talking about drag radials or slicks. Was recommended to run Drag radials since they will generally have a tad bit of slippage to them unless you shock them real hard. Go with a tire that is 10X26 and if using slicks, about a 9X26

January 26, 2008

The weather got better and I got of my ass and worked on the old girl for 4 hours. I am going very slowly because I have never done this before. I am really taking my time and over thinking each new step.

First step was to bolt the ring gear onto the posi unit. At first, I could not get the new bolts to thread until I remembered they were reverse threads. I put on some lock tight and place the bolts on using a star pattern with a stair-step torque method stopping at 90 foot-pounds. I thought I had been shorted a bolt but was fortunate to find it where some gremlin must have thrown it on the floor.

I used my muzzle-loader cleaning rod and gave the inside of the rear tubes a good cleaning. They were filled with junk and metal filings. Using WD40 I gave the remainder of the unit a good soaking and scrubbing.

Now I am ready to put the posi unit in the rear. I slapped on the races over the posi bearings. I found the correct shims; the ones in the photo are for the pinion gear, and started shimming. After fooling around and finding out how the grooved shims went in, I started with .075 on the left side and none on the right. Too tight���took out .010 and checked the backlash���only about .004 showed on the dial indicator. Tonight I will have to do the math and retry tomorrow.

January 27, 2008

Almost done���Today was shim day. I only had to take the carrier unit out and back in five times. I started to take out .010��� the .005��� of shim at a time ending with using .065��� extra on the left. That amount made the backlash at .0065���. I put some grease on the gears to check how they were meshing. I could see I was toe riding so I had to take out another .005��� of shim to increase the back last to .009���. Every thing looked good. I finished the day by putting on the rear cover then cleaning up. I will need to buy some posi additive and put lube in later.

My checklist

February 2, 2008

Much to my amazement I finally got the 10 bolt back together. I have new axles, bearings, seals and a posi unit. Now I will not be so embarrassed to light my tires (notice I wrote in plural not singular anymore) up at the drags.

Went for a test drive. All seems ok. Maybe a little wine on accleration but that could be the trans. Who knows. I plan to do a 50 mile break in before I let her rip.

Feb 12, 2008

So far so good. I have a little wine on medium speed slow turns. So, knock on wood let hope it stays together.

Feb 13, 2008

I fixed a problem that has been plaguing me for over 2 years. My charging system would keep cycling on and off. At first it only happened the battery was low or when the motor was hot but over the years it got to where it was happening all the time. I just changed the main circuit breaker and now all is OK.

I had a head light out on the right side. I traced it down to a broken wire to the light.

I have driven my car to work all week so far, today is Wednesday. My PT Cruiser blew a crank seal due to a wobbling crank shaft. Needless to say it is in the shop for the week.

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