gear problem

I had 4.56's installed by a professional mechanic 3 months ago. I just found out that the front ring gear broke a bunch of teeth off. My question is, since I just bought these could I possibly just replace the ring gear, if thats the only thing broken? Also if I was to do this myself, could I just take the whole assembly out somehow, replace the ring gear, and not have to worry about re shimming anything? does that make sense?

If you broke teeth off, you likely have damage to the pinion. What caused the broken teeth? Did the mechanic not lock-tite or properly torque the ring gear bolts and one got loose? If you replace the ring gear, you will have to reshim at least the carrier.

You will want to replace both the ring and pinion, or you'll be doing this again in another 3 months.

Ring and Pinion gears are machined as a set. They must be replaced as a set. A new set up is required, pinion depth, pinion bearing preload, backlash, carrier preload (although it will be nearly the same), and runout check will all need redone.

alright, new question, can I possibly run without the gears in for a little while or will I risk breaking something. I was thinking of taking the gears out and leaving the carrier in to hold the axleshafts in, is that right, I don't know much about gears?

This is on the front or rear? I don't remember, the forums have been flakey so long now..

Here is what my pinion looked like after breaking some ring teeth



Here is the ring gear


If one is broken, you're gonna be messing up the other fairly soon. Get em both replaced

mine look alot worse than that, but thats not my question, I know Im gonna have to replace them.

Can I take the gears out and run without them in 2wd so I could drive it for a little while until I can replace them?

oh yea its the front d30

and if I can take them out, how could I do that? would I have to leave the carrier in or what? will I risk breaking anything?

You could do that yeah, or pull your front driveshaft and put the stub axles in with no u-joints or inner shafts and you'd be fine too.

All you have to have is the outer axle there to set the preload on the unit bearing.

-C

Yep what Cal said.

One option:

Drop the Front DS at the axle.

Open the cover and see if you can manage to pry out the carrier. May have to put a large screw driver (very sturdy) in there and use a large pipe wrench, etc to turn the pinion and pop it out... Just be careful.

Then you should be fine to drive it...

If you're worried about leaving the shafts in then you are going to have to pull them and remove the u-joints so that you can replace the stub shafts and driving will be fine that way.

JUST DONT run it w/o the stub shafts in there..

Another Option:

Remove the Driveshaft,

Remove the axle shafts, remove the u-joints attaching the stub shaft to the axle shaft... replace the stub shaft (without the axle shafts) and drive it that way.

This way you leave the carrier in there w/ everything entacted... Take it back to the mechanic and tell him he set your gears up wrong... Unless it was your fault..

I probably wouldnt try and run with the inner shafts in and no carrier. In theory it would be ok (carrier seals holding the shafts in place) but I wouldnt want to trust that. Pull the ring gear off the carrier and put it back in, or pull the u-joints off the shafts and put just the outers back in.

-C

ok, could you guys be more specific on how to do this, im kinda getting an idea of what your saying but not sure how to do it.

I would like to keep the axleshafts in, and the carrier in, just take off the ring gear. what would I have to do to take the ring gear off?

This is no small task, but not really a big one either.


It is however, more than I have time to type up right now.

If someone doesnt type up a good walk thru by tonight, I'll try and do it.

-C

thanks man, ive got a big snowstorm coming tommorrow, and I would much rather have a 2wd cherokee with 33's than a 2wd s10 with slicks

Will he not still have to pull the axle shafts out to get the carrier out to remove the ring gear? I would pull the front DS and remove the inner axle shafts. Keeping the gear assembly together for the mechanic to see what went wrong.

My question is why do you want to leave the carrier in?

Did you break the stuff or was it the mechanics fault? If it's a mechanics fault take it back to him and have him fix it.

I for one wouldnt touch anything if I though I was not the cause... Basically if you remove it your accepting blame for the breakage and will most likely not be able to get any help from the shop that did the work.

BUT if you must remove it... do a search on gear install and just do it backwards.. and its going to take you a while if you're not familiar with how to do it...

Here's a very vague procedure:

1. jack up the jeep and remove the tires
2. remove the break caliper bolts and pop the caliper off (10mm i think)
3. get a 13mm 12pt socket and remove the three bolts holding the shafts in
4. use a hammer and beat the shafts out
5. remove the front driveshaft by the pumpkin
6. take off the cover and drain all that stinking fluid out
7. remove the bolts that are holding the carrier in
8. if the carrier will pop out then pop it out otherwise wedge a large screwdriver in there or something similar
9. use a large wrench and twist the pinion yoke until the carrier pops out (probably want someone to help its heavy and will fall and crack your concrete garage floor)
10. remove the ring gear
11. put the carrier back in
12. put the cover back on
13. put the shafts back in
14. put the caliper back on
15. attach the driveshaft
16. put the tires back on
17. drive it

May need to put some fluid in the diff.

This may be correct, may not be.. there may even be an easier way so we'll see... Just have fun and its going to take you awhile....


-OR-

1. remove the front driveshaft completely
2. remove the axle shafts
3. remove the u-joints (easy job w/ hammer as long as the caps arent welded)
4. put the stub shafts back in

Then you have a 2wd cherokee...

Chris

uncc civilengineer said:

My question is why do you want to leave the carrier in?

Did you break the stuff or was it the mechanics fault? If it's a mechanics fault take it back to him and have him fix it.

I for one wouldnt touch anything if I though I was not the cause... Basically if you remove it your accepting blame for the breakage and will most likely not be able to get any help from the shop that did the work.

BUT if you must remove it... do a search on gear install and just do it backwards.. and its going to take you a while if you're not familiar with how to do it...

Here's a very vague procedure:

1. jack up the jeep and remove the tires
2. remove the break caliper bolts and pop the caliper off
3. get a 13mm 12pt socket and remove the three bolts holding the shafts in
4. use a hammer and beat the shafts out (hub and shaft assembly)
5. remove the front driveshaft by the pumpkin
6. take off the cover and drain all that stinking fluid out
7. remove the bolts that are holding the carrier in
8. if the carrier will pop out then pop it out otherwise wedge a large screwdriver in there or something similar
9. use a large wrench and twist the pinion yoke until the carrier pops out (probably want someone to help its heavy and will fall and crack your concrete garage floor) I use something to keep the carier from spinning and use a breaker bar on one of teh carrier bolts (it will roll out) hth
10. remove the ring gear
11. put the carrier back in
12. put the cover back on
13. put the shafts back in
14. put the caliper back on
15. attach the driveshaft
16. put the tires back on
17. drive it

May need to put some fluid in the diff.

This may be correct, may not be.. there may even be an easier way so we'll see... Just have fun and its going to take you awhile....


-OR-

1. remove the front driveshaft completely
2. remove the axle shafts (1-4 above)
3. remove the u-joints (easy job w/ hammer as long as the caps arent welded)
4. put the stub shafts back in

Then you have a 2wd cherokee...

Chris

Click to expand...

I added a little to option one.

But I would go with option 2 if I were you. but still drain the fluid, or it will end up all over your brakes.

I'm with Brian. From experience, if you broke ring gear teeth, you got metal crap in the bearings. If you leave the axles in, the carrier still turns, and bearings could get chewed up, causing even more damage, IE spun bearings on the carrier, terrible screeching noise, Jeep stops moving.

IMHO, it's a lot safer to pull the inner shafts.

well, I would much rather just pull the axle shafts and driveshafts, but, I was worried about that putting to much stress on the hubs, my brother, has a 96 dodge truck and he broke the short side axle shaft so we took it out so we could drive it home, and we ended up driving it for about an hour and the hub broke, and the wheel damn near fell off. so im on a very limited budget as it is and I don't want to break anything else.

if you guys think the hubs will be all right, then I'll do that.

Also, the thing is I don't really have a warranty or anything on the gears because I had a mechanic that works at a chevy dealer do it on the side. so it was not done by a shop, although he is a professional mechanic it was done in his garage.

I didn't break it, really haven't done anything to hard with it since the gears and I followed Randy's break in instructions so, im guessin they were set up wrong.