Sunday, June 30, 2013

That Dana 44 axle (the rear axle that did not come with the Jeep) is being darned recalcitrant.  I can't get the hubs off, and I can't get the axle shafts out.  On the D41 (the rear axle that did come on the Jeep), the hubs popped off easily, and the axle shafts slid right out after undoing the flange bolts.  I have no idea what to do differently...  (There's not supposed to be anything different between the two axles when it comes to disassembly.)

So I moved onto the front.  I got both knuckles off the D25 (the front axle that came on the Jeep) and disassembled.  No difficult parts to that at all.  (Now I'll have to try the D27--the spare front axle...)  After being stuck so long on that D44, it felt good to actually get something done.

One weird thing, though.  The washers inside one of the front hubs were totally mangled.  The splines on that shaft were also slightly mangled.  I took some pictures, and I'll add them to this post at a later date (when I get around to it...)  No idea what could have caused that--it even looked like it had been assembled that way from earlier damage.

Edit:  Here's the pictures.

The outer washer:
 And the inner one:
There were no bits of metal in there...

2 comments:

Wade Bortz said...

2nd try at posting this.. :)

I think that was from when the wheel fell off on RB. I wasn't around at the time, but something about the bearing completely failing, and only the tie rod holding everything together. :)

Paul S. said...

If I understand it correctly (I'll have to go back and reread everything before I reassemble), you're actually supposed to bend the edge of that washer down to hold the nut in place. The other three front hubs I pulled all had bent washers. This one is unique in that someone made tabs on it to bend...

I don't know what's up with the inner washer, though. That's the only one of the four that wasn't round.