Let's talk Gears - Installation help please!

Okay, my gears are a little shallow so I'm going to see if I can find some 4.10's for dirt cheap at a junk yard. I've pulled carriers out of 30's and 35's before, so that's not a problem, but I have some questions for the pinion and installing the used gears in my axles...

What size is the pinion nut? I want to have the right socket. Any tips on remving the nut (I've never removed a pinion, only carriers to count pinion teeth). I will not have access to air or power tools.

What do I need to do to install the gears? I have an FSM and admit to not looking at it yet, I know thsi has been beaten to death over and over, just curious if I should do anything differently as I'll be getting used gears. What tools will I need, and what can I get by without using?

I'm looking to have these gears in so I can drive to Moab much easier than my current 3.55 on 31's.

Thanks,
Sequoia

Sad to say this is a case of the blind leading the blind, but I just rebuilt a D44 and put a posi in my D30 so at least I've done the job although if I've done it correctly is yet to be seen...

Here's the special tools I needed:

Soft face hammer - pounding pinion out - $5 at Harbor Freight

Bearing installation tool - (conical aluminum with a central rod to pound on) - for putting inner pinion bearing race into housing - $16 at Pep Boys

3# dead blow hammer - for putting carrier into housing - $27 at Sears

0 - 150# torque wrench - securing of various bolts

Light torque wrench (0 - ?? inch-oz) - for setting pinion preload

20 ton press - pressing inner pinion bearing on/off, carrier bearings on/off - $250 at Harbor Freight

Bearing splitter - for use with press to remove pinion and carrier bearings - bought this one on-line for about $40

Adapter - to remove carrier bearings on the press (it isn't wide enough to simply hang the carrier between its lower supports) - home made

Dial indicator and magnetic base - for setting carrier backlash - $25 at Minn. Ind. Supply

Micometer - for measuring pinion and carrier shim thicknesses - $10 at Minn. Indust. Supply

1 1/8" Pinion yoke nut socket - for installing/removing nut - $4 (and you'll need implements to apply a great deal of torque)

Gear puller - for pulling pinion yoke off shaft

Big pipe wrench - for holding yoke while installing/removing pinion yoke nut.

Long tapered punch or other rod - for tapping old pinion bearing races out of housing.

Other tools that I've forgotten to mention...

Suggest you hunt around on www.naxja.org for various posts to learn how to do the installation. Search under my name and you'll find a couple. Yukon gear has a instruction manual on line at
http://www.diferentials.com/tech/yukoninst.pdf

I don't think that there is any way you can avoid doing the pinion depth setup. I also doubt that you can avoid doing the carrier backlash setup either. The really major problem is getting the inner pinion bearing and carrier bearings pressed off and on as you perform these adjustments. If you use the existing carrier and simply bolt the new ring gear onto it, and if you look at the depth markings on the old and new pinions and adjust shims accordingly (still a press operation) then maybe if you are lucky you'll end up with a properly built diff. I wouldn't count on this though and would be prepared to press bearings. The press is the expensive part. There are pullers that could replace the press, but I don't know where these can be purchased.

If there is someone in your locale who will do the install I'd suggest you simply pay the money. Here in North San Diego county that person is Ryan Brown (www.rawbrown.com) who will install for $150. He sold me my new gears and was nice enough to explain to me how to do certain tasks that were confusing in the FSM or the Yukon docs. It's worth the money. I did my own since I wanted to learn how it is done, but it cost me more in tooling in the long run and it took many hours to complete.

Hope this helps...

Its gonna be fun getting the pinion nut off witout air tools......just my $.02. But I believe its like a 1 and 1/4 6 point socket. Thats on a Chrysler 81/4 the 35 may be different.

jeepguy97 said:

Its gonna be fun getting the pinion nut off witout air tools......just my $.02. But I believe its like a 1 and 1/4 6 point socket. Thats on a Chrysler 81/4 the 35 may be different.

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It's doable... did that twice in the boneyard 2 months ago. The fun part was making sure that the wheels are locked. For fronts what you can do is find some bolts that drop into the disks and wedge against calipers. For rears.. hope that the brake cables are still attached and working

if you are going to get 410's from the junk yard why don't you get the whole axle and swap it in. You'll save your self a great deal of headaches.