dana 30 went BOOM

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

Well driving along I started to notice a little click from the front end, that little click became a little bang and the little bang became a big pow.... You get the picture.

The ring gear was missing 5 teeth when I pulled the cover. I noticed that one of the teeth had a hole in it like it had a hollow spot.

These are yukon 4.88s and I'm pretty sure that yukons are decent product how likely do you think it may have been a defect in the manufacturing process?

These were installed by ryan brown aka rawbrown so I have no doubt that the installation was kosher and I followed all of the procedures that ryan suggested and then some, drove for 5, 15, 25, 50 miles then let cool. Changed the oil at 100, 250 and 500 miles and they fell apart around mile 700.

I have pictures if someone could post them for me that would be awesome because I'm sending this from my cell phone.

 

[OT]

Talk to Ryan about it?

 

[scorpio_vette]

e-mail me the pics and i'll post them here for you. [email protected]

 

[53guy]

Sounds like a problem with the gears, but just throwing it out there, what driving conditions did you break them in under? What were you doing when they broke? ie, speed, actions, etc.

 

[OT]

Were all the bolts still in the ring gear?

 

[XgeekstarX]

it's crazy, the only ring and pinions i hear about breaking on here are yukons

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

Talk to Ryan about it?

Left him emails n voice mails poor dude probably been up all night drinkin his psychobrew and has like 4 installs he needs to get done before 12am the next day.

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

All the ring gear bolts were still on and still at spec torque cause I checked em with a torque wrench when I pulled the carrier. I see nothing but faulty gears as the cause of this.

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

I was leaving my house and I got to a stop light and I noticed the clicking when I was slowing down to stop at the light. I never got over 50 mph that morning and when I pulled the cover at 500 miles the gears still looked perfect and there was NO metal in the oil. When I pulled away at the light under light throttle that's when the click turned into boom. Man I'm so pissed my birthday is coming up and my wife just informed me that she had a bunch of my buddies with xjs here in 29 palms ready to have a run through rattle snake canyon up heartbreak ridge, then onto dishpan creek, holcomb creek and john bull. Man I'm bummed beyond belief.

 

[scorpio_vette]

I was leaving my house and I got to a stop light and I noticed the clicking when I was slowing down to stop at the light. I never got over 50 mph that morning and when I pulled the cover at 500 miles the gears still looked perfect and there was NO metal in the oil. When I pulled away at the light under light throttle that's when the click turned into boom. Man I'm so pissed my birthday is coming up and my wife just informed me that she had a bunch of my buddies with xjs here in 29 palms ready to have a run through rattle snake canyon up heartbreak ridge, then onto dishpan creek, holcomb creek and john bull. Man I'm bummed beyond belief.

don't be bummed.....when is your b-day??? call and get the gears warrantied or order a new set overnight and then sell the other ones when you get them warrantied. it only takes a few hours to put a D30 together.

 

[scorpio_vette]

here is a pic that xXJx send me.

since xXJx said it looked like there might have been an airpocket in one of the pieces, it could very well have been defective.

it's a bad pic, but since it was at such low milage, and based on the pics it almost looks like you might have played a little to hard before breaking the gears in properly.

did you do any wheeling between the install and the first 500miles???

and some better quality pics with some better lighting (watch out for reflective glare) would definitely help

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

There was no wheeling done in the first 500. Only used 4 wheel drive a handful of times real recently, ie the last 100 miles. I drove from 29 palms through rattle snake canyon then up heartbreak ridge into big bear. Then drove back. Drove to work 3 times back and forth (only 7 miles round trip) then on time #4 pop bang.

Ill email some more pics to post up scorp, I'm doin the best that I can with my tmobile sidekick II! I really need to get my laptop fixed and route some t1 from the usmc base.

 

[scorpio_vette]

sounds to me like they didn't like your "through rattle snake canyon then up heartbreak ridge into big bear". it's hard to say, and in the end the decision on wether or not it'll be warrantied is up to the manufacturer.

it could really be several thing, the gear install could have been slightly out of spec, there could have been a defect in the gear, etc..etc..
i personally haven't broken gears like that, but it almost looks like somebody beat on a set of brand new gears and sheared them off before they got hardened.

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

sounds to me like they didn't like your "through rattle snake canyon then up heartbreak ridge into big bear". it's hard to say, and in the end the decision on wether or not it'll be warrantied is up to the manufacturer.

it could really be several thing, the gear install could have been slightly out of spec, there could have been a defect in the gear, etc..etc..
i personally haven't broken gears like that, but it almost looks like somebody beat on a set of brand new gears and sheared them off before they got hardened.

Heartbreak ridge and rattle snake canyon are weak, I never had wheelspin once and I walked up the entire thing without any problems.

How long until gears are worn in? I'm sure they were used at the very very least 700 miles most of which was short drives to work. I don't understand. Ill try and take a better pic of that tooth with the pocket

 

[scorpio_vette]

usually they recommend around 200ish miles of city driving and then city/highway until a total of 500ish.

so if you think you've already put 700miles on them, then they should have been broken in.

you installed the gears for you???

have you talked to the place/manufacturer that you bought the gears from yet???

 

[xDUMPTRUCKx]

usually they recommend around 200ish miles of city driving and then city/highway until a total of 500ish.

so if you think you've already put 700miles on them, then they should have been broken in.

you installed the gears for you???

have you talked to the place/manufacturer that you bought the gears from yet???

Ryan brown installed em, not me. That's why I'm sure it was defective gear set. jesus hasn't come back yet cause he knows his gear install skills arnt on par with ryan. Ill let ryan decide if they are defective or not next weekend when I drive down to his shop.

Man there goes all the money I was savin to buy some new rockrails and material to make a new rear bumper.

 

[dsgray16]

You can send the gears in for waranty, they will run tests to see if it was bad gears or bad instal

i blew a set of 4.88's from yukon, but only because the gears were setuo wrong

i would deff check the pattern before being so positive its bad gears

 

[Kittrell]

I would def. check the pattern before being so positive its bad gears

If Ryan set them up, I'd be positive too.

 

[Jeepdogrob]

If Ryan set them up, I'd be positive too.

X2, if you haven't done so, send him a PM.

 

[robs]

Wrought materials shouldn't have any "holes" and I can't believe anyone would cast a ring gear blank (can get porosity and other defects).

The picture isn't very good, but I don't see any obvious material defects. Looks like a normal overload type failure. The mechanical damage is high, but it looks pretty much like all the gear failures I've normally seen that were overload type. Fracture behavior don't support a casting either (based on one picture that isn't too great on a gear with lots of mechanical damage).

Take some close ups of the teeth that were stripped off. They shouldn't have the mechanical damage on them of the ring gear itself.