DIY driveshaft?

OK someone set me strait here... why cant i cut the yokes of of a drive shaft, weld them together and make a cv type shaft with a stock slip yoke. i know there must be a reason but i cant think of one, maybe it would be real sloppy or something but maybe not. anyone done anything like this before?
thanks
-chuck

With out the correct tools you will never get the shaft as a whole to balance right. So it will at speed vibrate all over the place..... =not good

That colorado 4x4 writeup looks plenty doable - but I don't think he stressed getting it straight and true quite as much as he could have. These two elements are critical, and no amount of balancing will correct either one.

I like the "sammich jig" idea for phasing the yoke ends tho - looks like something that I wish I'd thought of (but I've not had to shorten a driveshaft yet...)

I followed that write-up to build a temporary shaft for my son's heep. Had it up to 55mph with no appriaciable vibes. The key word here is temporary.

Frank Z said:

I followed that write-up to build a temporary shaft for my son's heep. Had it up to 55mph with no appriaciable vibes. The key word here is temporary.

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Temp or low-speed, unless you're going to spend the money to get it checked (which will probably still have you ahead of buying new...)

You'd better have some confidence in your ability to cut and weld tho - and to make sure you have things straight (the old Mk1 Mod0 eyeball may not be good enough for checking alignment - tools work better.)

Agreed. Balancing is dirt cheep compared to tossing a shaft at highway speed.

thanks guys, but i was wondering if anyone had seen the cv section made by putting together two yokes...

What? No way!

why? i can only think balancing would be a problem, but i am just an average over thinker!

Because the stress exerted on it makes it unreliable at best. Why try to reinvent the wheel when a double cardon joint will cost all of $10-15 at your local junk yard?

i have made plenty of drive shafts in the backyard. i have never made my own CV joint or double carden though. if you look at, it has a middle "balljoint" along with the 2 ujoints. really not possible to make that with just 2 ordinary yokes.

cutting the yokes off so you can reuse them is the most important. i usually cut right on the weld so that there is enough meat for shaft tubing to get a good seat and for adjustment purposes.

if i need to make a driveshaft with a CV joint at one end and a slip yoke at the other. i just find 2 driveshafts with what i need and try to get them with similar diameter tubing or just go the custom driveshaft place, buy new tubing and cut it length, then weld on the ends.

to make them as straight as possible, take 4 small castor wheels and screw them to your bench, 2 at each end of the shaft so that the driveshaft can rotate and use a dial caliper to test the heights and make it within .005 and you should be good.

i have made plenty like this and have never had an issue of them blowing up or anything. just make sure you use a decent welder.

if you ever need some help just pm and i can help my best.

If your running a trail only rig its very easy to make super strong cv drive lines from sq tube. More common with toyota guys.

Frank Z said:

Agreed. Balancing is dirt cheep compared to tossing a shaft at highway speed.

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They do look really cool bouncing down the highway tho. going the rest of the way to work in FWD is no fun however.

OK i knew i was missing something, it is the ball joint issue that i hadnt thought of, but i do like the write up previously mentioned
http://www.colorado4x4.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=68456