Rear wheel noise

5.7 hemi said:

If you can find an 8 3/4 or Dana housing that is perfectly straight after 40-50 years of use, buy a lotto ticket. I narrowed my buddy’s D60 truck housing that has 3/8 wall tubing and it was slightly bent. How did I know it was bent? I have a center less ground bar and machined pucks to go with it. It was off an 1/8. Also before I started narrowing housings, the place I went to told me “no housing is perfectly straight”! Now if you bought one from Moser, Strange, etc., yeah, they are gonna be straight.

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You mentioned you narrowed your friend's D60 truck housing but did not say how much you narrowed it and it was "slightly" bent. Just how much is slightly?. You made a GO-NO GO gauge out of a centerless ground steel rod and machined slugs presumably turned on center with respect to the rod's center line, to try and measure axle tube TIR (Total Indicated Runout). I would think that the shorter the axle tubes are in length the less influence there are on the outboard axle bearings offset loading. And more importantly do you check for side to side axle shaft flange parallelism while rotating the assembly? And if more then 0.003" - 0.004" TIR, how do you "fix" the issue. Just curious.....enquiring minds want to know.....I case I want to check my D60. Thanks in advance for your help.
Bob Renton

Let’s make this simple, centerless ground rod is approximately 69 inches, 1.250 diameter. Pucks are chucked into the lathe, turned for an ID of 1.254, outside is turned to just under the OD of a factory bearing, same goes for the pucks in the carrier or a D60.

The carrier pucks are installed and caps tightened up, bar is slid through the housing into the pucks. Now we have to get the flange pucks in, slide them onto the bar and see how far off they are from going into the flange. That will tell you exactly where the housing tubes are located. When off, the housing has to held stationary, heat and a puller (usually a chain) and you go to town. Once the rod slides in/out of all the pucks without any binding, your good.

Now this is also how you narrow a rear, it’s actually quite simple. I don’t know all the stuff you wrote cause Im just your average guy that can build rear ends, not Space Shuttles. Don’t make this into something it’s not, I don’t have an Engineering Degree, but I have stayed at a Holiday Inn. Of course, this is just my opinion, yours may differ.

5.7 hemi said:

Let’s make this simple, centerless ground rod is approximately 69 inches, 1.250 diameter. Pucks are chucked into the lathe, turned for an ID of 1.254, outside is turned to just under the OD of a factory bearing, same goes for the pucks in the carrier or a D60.

The carrier pucks are installed and caps tightened up, bar is slid through the housing into the pucks. Now we have to get the flange pucks in, slide them onto the bar and see how far off they are from going into the flange. That will tell you exactly where the housing tubes are located. When off, the housing has to held stationary, heat and a puller (usually a chain) and you go to town. Once the rod slides in/out of all the pucks without any binding, your good.

Now this is also how you narrow a rear, it’s actually quite simple. I don’t know all the stuff you wrote cause Im just your average guy that can build rear ends, not Space Shuttles. Don’t make this into something it’s not, I don’t have an Engineering Degree, but I have stayed at a Holiday Inn.

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THANK YOU for your email and information. The next time I pull the axles to pack the axle bearings I'll check the axle tubes for straightness. Although I do not have a bearing problem at this time, it cannot hurt to know the condition of the axle assembly just in case. The Dana 60 is origional to the car (and I've owned it for ~ 35 years) but one never knows. I guess you need different OD pucks for all the different rear end assemblies you work on.....I'll check the axle flanges for runout to see if any tube may be bent. BTW.....I am an engineer but I do not build space shuttles but I run a 75 man (all trades including millwrights, welders, electricians, brick masons, laborers, etc.) maintenance department in a chemical plant, that deals with all aspects of all machinery and process equipment including a coal fired co generation power plant, I also have stayed at a Holiday Inn, but usually a Courtyard Inn by Marriott.....they have better complimentary breakfasts. Thanks again ....
Bob Renton

Keep in mind the car D60’s May have a thinner tube (thickness) than the trucks. I haven’t worked on a car D60 so I’m just guessing.

5.7 hemi said:

Keep in mind the car D60’s May have a thinner tube (thickness) than the trucks. I haven’t worked on a car D60 so I’m just guessing.

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When I do pull the axles, I'll check the tube OD & ID inside of the axle bearing location and compare the dimensions to see if they are tubes or pipe (based on the tube and pipe dimension criteria). The axle tubes MAY BE even welded pipe or as I mentioned b4 DOM tubing. Thanks again for your help.....
Bob Renton

tommytmopar said:

my RR has developed a rear wheel noise. As I get to 40 mph sounds like the right rear wheel is grinding, gets louder as speed increases. Popped the trans in neutral still got it. Have my green wheel bearings started going bad? Could it be brake related? Parking brake? I thought it was the chunk but changed that out got the same condition. 8 3/4 rear. My foam seals were pretty bad wonder if I’ve damaged those bearings. They don’t have a lot of miles but I’ve been extremely rough on the rear end. Thanks in advance.

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If you are a streeter, IMO,there is no such thing as being extremely rough on an 8.75.
When I install new bearings, I flush out all the brand new factory grease and repack with something I have confidence in. My tapered bearings were well-used when I installed them in 1999, and have never been repacked. I have put 125,000 or more miles on those myself, and they might have seen that much before I installed them;who knows.
If you're having problems with bearings back there, I'm betting it's the grease.
And if they are bad, replace 'em with tapereds. Setting the endplay can be done without tools and takes all of 20 seconds, if yur slow.
Compared to tapered bearings, ball bearings are much more heavily loaded over a much smaller area; they depend very heavily on the grease for lubrication and for cooling.
The grease has to stay in the cavity. If you knocked out the inner seal and are lubing with hypoid oil, good luck with that. At the factory fill-level, the filler plug is too low to insure adequate oiling to the bearings; And if you overfill it, it will blow out the vent. And if/when the oil gets contaminated, well, that will get into your bearings, won't it. And never mind if the pinion seal gets to leaking.
If you are getting the idea that I'm no fan of ball-bearing axle bearings, you would be right. But take heart, there are worse designs for this application, namely; caged needle rollers or bushings.

Referencing a recent article in Mopar Action Magazine , a response to a "green bearing" question to Rick Ehrenberg:
"you do know that those Green ball bearings have MUCH less capacity than the stock Timken tapered roller bearings, and are recommended for straight-line (read: drag racing) use only?

...and in another industry, does anyone recall the problems H-D had with the 1999-2000 heavy bikes when some bean-counter saved money by using caged ball bearings for the cam bearings? Right a disaster and a recall. Ball bearings ( caged ) do not fend well with side loads. My 2000 Road King received new Timken cam bearings when S&S cams were swapped in... and by 65 Belvedere , 8 3/4, received new Timken bearings during a recent rebuild. No problems.

Take what Rick says with a grain of salt.