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Tandem axle spring seat & shaft, repair and upgrade?

gringeltaube

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A common problem found when restoring older deuces is that grease and bearings inside the rear spring seat are long gone and the brg. cones had severely worn out their seats on the shaft. Often even the spindle nuts and thread are dangerously worn! Replacing the roller bearings with solid cone inserts alone like some newer models already have, wouldn't cure the problem.
So either find another part or repair yours! Not an option where I live! :(

Material + labor to replace the whole steel bar was way too much $$ so I tried something different which I think could be an upgrade at the same time: turned both shaft ends (spindles) down to obtain an even surface (61.9 ->59.6mm diam.), re-threaded the ends, sleeved the spindles (-> 66.68mm) and installed the stronger #3994 bearing cones - which actually use the full width of the #3992 cups (same as the inner wheel bearings).
Difference in width is about ¼" so to maintain the seat centered I removed 2mm off of the bracket and also 1.4mm of the (inner) brg cone flank (there is enough material there).
I also had to fab custom nuts (for a 3-½" 8-point socket, same as for the M105) and find a way to secure them without a lock ring. It took a while to figure this out.... :idea: (as so often, pics are better than 1000 words....)

Just out of curiosity I also checked the bore (seat) for the bearing cups #3992, for roundness. To my surprise they all seem to have a tendency for deformation adopting an oval shape, way beyond tolerances. I had to scrap one of them (with a difference measured over cross of almost 0.01" (= 0.2mm !!!) and managed to refurbish another 4 which "only" were 0.1mm off.

Since the smaller size always appears in the vertical direction, once assembled and properly preloaded we sure have a tremendous additional strain on upper and lower bearing races respectively, added to the normal forces from the vehicles weight and load. No wonder that the normal maintenance and/or just replacing the std. bearings doesn't help for too long!

It will take some time though, to find out how much of an improvement this really was.

Probably someone else here has been that far and could throw in some ideas or has a better remedy to fix this in a more practical/economical way ?????

Gerhard
 

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OPCOM

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That's really great and high tech work there! I can only hope i never have a problem with that part of the suspension. I doo keep it full of grease.. loosen the bolts, pump grease in till it comes out, and that is alot of grease in there! .. tighen the bolts & all done . evey 2 years.
 

jwaller

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great job. I know I lube mine all the time but I've never taken the cover completely off. I just loosen it and squeeze grease in till it comes out.
 

gringeltaube

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Thank you all! For our hobby..., everything and much more!

Good for those who still have easy access to good take-out parts for cheap.
There will come times we will have to save everything repairable to keep'em rolling...
(...or wait for KIA to start selling parts or even deuces to the public!!! Who knows, maybe Uncle Sam could do some good business there..... :) )

For the ones that loosen the front cover to make sure enough grease went in: it's good to have it filled but keep in mind that dirt and water only enter from the backside of the seat. So that's where we really wanted to see clean grease coming out. Don't be afraid of ruining or pressing out the seal, it won't happen. And that seal works like a check valve allowing for all excess to easily escape past both, seal and dust shied, helping to "flush" water and sand out.

G.
 

tm america

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nice work only thing i see that you might run into is where you cut it down and sleeved it even though you put a sleeve on it for the bearings to ride on you still have a narrower cross section where the sleeve hits the inner part away from the threads. thiscould end up being a problem since it is taking the full weight of the rear suspension .but i think you will be ok with 2mm total being taken off that area since its only 1mm off the cross section:roll:its great you have access to the tool to get a job like that done even though its a pain to get parts over there for you
 

gringeltaube

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No problem... always open to suggestions! :)
In this case the material removed was just about enough to get worn surfaces back straight and even...

One improvement that I would like to (again) suggest to all of you still having "sound" parts: simply add a grease zerk on the upper side of the cover cup. It not only is easier to be seen and reached with a grease gun but also ensures better "flushing" of the whole assy., especially getting fresh lube to the outer bearing.

G.
 

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gringeltaube

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Reviving a one-year old thread...... and very curious to know how many of you have found exactly this.......:mad: (pics below) and what the remedy was...:???:

BTW, this was probably done at the time and place of overhaul.... (see dataplate)

G.
 

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tommys2patrick

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Gringletaube-- you do amazing work and your thought process to make repairs and improvements is inspiring. Way beyond my expertise, tools and skill. That being said, I appreciate your suggestion for adding the grease zerk. I noticed on the drawing the "original" fill point. Does that need to be plugged some how to make sure the old grease/dirt/sludge passes out of the seal rather than thru this "port" as it was designed? Or have I missed something in your description?
 

gringeltaube

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Gringletaube-- you do amazing work and your thought process to make repairs and improvements is inspiring. Way beyond my expertise, tools and skill. That being said, I appreciate your suggestion for adding the grease zerk. I noticed on the drawing the "original" fill point. Does that need to be plugged some how to make sure the old grease/dirt/sludge passes out of the seal rather than thru this "port" as it was designed? Or have I missed something in your description?
Thank you...!
That orifice shown there is never "open"- should not, at least! It either comes with a plug already, or you will find a std. grease fitting there. And sometimes its just the remnants of such... (some "mechanics" seem to prefer just that spot, to place a jack there, without even suspecting that there was that zerk...!)



G.
 
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