rear axle pinion seal ?

[GT350]

can i replace the rear pinion seal on a 9 inch diff using the old crush sleeve or would i have to fit a new crush sleeve and start again with pre load etc

 

[stangg]

I've heard some folks mark the position of the pinion nut in respect to the yoke and put the nut right back where it was. So long as your not changing anything else it seems to be a reasonble method. If you start with a new crush sleeve, then I think you'll have to remove the pinion support in order to properly check / set the rotational torque on the pinion bearings because that is supposed to be done without anything else influencing the torque reading on the pinion bearing preload.

I've got to replace a pinion seal on my chebby 12 bolt rear and have been looking into the possibility of changing it from as crush sleeve to a solid spacer... but since the crush sleeve extends slightly when unbolted, it would be a fair amount of work to get the preload properly set. The benifit to the solid spacer is once it's set you can remove and replace the seal without any concern for preload checking.

What I may do on mine is, mark the nut position, with the wheels and brake drums removed, record the amount of force (in/lb) it takes to rotate the pinion, gear set and axles, count number of revolutions it takes to completely remove the nut, replace the seal, put the same nut back one with red loctite, set the nut back to the exact same position, recheck the torque it takes to rotate the assembly.