Looking for shop in Sac for pinion bearing replacement

[Jeep450r]

I need my Dana 30 pinion bearing and seal replaced and pinion preload need to be set. I don't have the tools up here with me to do It so I need to bring it to a shop. Any recommendations?

 

[Johnnie Walker]

What about the guys at GS motorsports that did your gears before? Or, have jon do it. haha.

 

[Jeep450r]

Lol golden state is the place that messed it up in the first place.

 

[DaveNJeep]

I can recommend Ring and Pinion Service in Rancho Cordova. They are the service connected to West Coast Differentials. I recently had them do a job for me and it was done as promised, on time.

 

[blondejoncherokee]

so theres a spot, that everyone on pirate digs, river city differentials. west coast is good too. Ive had them do gears before,actually a few times.

I am pretty sure since you need the pinion bearing, that they will tell you labor will be like 300-400 (basically going to be re doing gear setup, yah ?)

so consider at this point getting a master install (rwkhaus on here has em for like 82$ shipped , or something like that) dont quote me on price. But they might say all of that....
so ya, consider getting all of the bearings done and thoroughly checking out your carrier for cracks...


so we are seeing, that good gear installs arent cheap, and cheap installs arent good...

think about that this time around.

Or just pop the pinion out, and slap a new bearing on and pray. Do you have access to a shop press?

 

[Jeep450r]

Well it isn't really a full gear install. You can pull the pinion out and replace the bearing without throwing off the gear pattern.

I'd love to do this myself but I don't have access to the tools I need. I don't have what I need to break that pinion bearing loose. And I don't have an inch pound torque wrench for setting the preload. Other than that, it would be a heck of a lot cheaper to only pay a shop to press the bearing on/off if I could do the rest.

Ill call around after class today and see what the prices look like.

 

[GordoSmasho]

Inner or outer bearing. Both? What did they screw up that made them go bad?

 

[zachandandy]

If the pinion bearings went that fast, I'd say either a bearing wasn't seated properly or the preload was way off?

 

[Jeep450r]

Inner or outer bearing. Both? What did they screw up that made them go bad?

I honestly didn't realize there even was an inner bearing. I know the outer is bad because it had a good amount of up/down/side/side play in it. If I'm going to tear it all apart I might as well do it all.

If the pinion bearings went that fast, I'd say either a bearing wasn't seated properly or the preload was way off?

Thats exactly my guess. Theres no resistance when rotating the pinion right now, which either means that there was never enough/any preload, or the bearing is so shot that it loosened up and there is no preload any more.

 

[blondejoncherokee]

thats why I was saying youll probably end up having the gear pattern reset and want a master install (at the very least pinion depth ) . A master for 80$, or both pinion bearings for like 60$ at shop prices? They will argue that the pinion is too deep or not deep enough. probably not have to reset backlash, but pinion depth will probably be off. In my case, from golden state, they didnt seat one of the pinion bearing races all the way, didnt have the proper tool to do so at the shop Rob said. So it seated on its own down the road, causing lots of slop. we pulled the pinion out and pulled some shims in my garage and ran it that way. I would imagine if you want to save money that you can probably just pull the outer pinion bearing and replace it, and just do that and see how deep the pinion is on the ring gear and if its acceptable run it? Perhaps the pinion nut came loose? are you sure thats not the problem?


Gear oil silver in color or does it look more like oil?

 

[Jeep450r]

Jon maybe the same thing happened to me, and the bearing seated itself causing slop? Idk.

Gear oil looks fine but the fill plug magnet always catches a little bit of fine metal goop. But that could be from my gears wearing? Dunno lol

 

[Jeep450r]

An the pinion bearing is tight. That's the main reason why I can't do this myself. It's too tight to get off lol

 

[blondejoncherokee]

well you need a good shop press to press the bearing off.

 

[GordoSmasho]

Not the outer bearing. It should be a slide on. The inner bearing is most deffinately pressed on. But you do need to pull the carrier to get the race out.

Breaker bar the nut. It will break loose. I pull spare yokes in the junk yards all the time. Put the tires on the ground and crank it. You can also use a big plummers wrench to hold the yoke if your beyond that point already. Once loose then pull the carrier out and the pinion next. Then knock out the outer race. Get a race driving kit from harbor freight. Drive the new outer race in and put the pinion back in. Snug it up, put the carrier back in and check the pattern. If it looks ok then set the preload for the pinion and your good. I got my inch pound torque wrench from mikes bikes online for ~40$. A good investment if you want to learn some diff work.

I just rebuild my 8.8 with about 100$ invested at harbor freight. Not saying they are the right tools but they deffinately got me through it and probably a few more.

 

[Rob D]

Just a thought, if the pinion bearings are really all shot to heck, you may find you'll need to replace to carrier bearings as well. The reason being that there is a good chance bearing cage pieces, or actual bearing pieces, may have gotten into everything inside the case. So, check to make sure your gears and carrier bearings/races are still in good shape and no metal shavings have gotten into everything before you slap it all back together. It might save you another re-do sooner than you'd want.

I usually just take the pinion and/or carrier to the local machine shop and have them press off the old bearings for me. The rest you can do in your garage. I've even used a short length of pipe with a threaded cap on the end to drive the pinion bearing on. Just make sure to completely blow out any possible metal shavings from the bearing after it's installed. Keep track of any shims that come off from behind the bearings and most likely the same ones will work behind the new bearing on the inner pinion bearing.

Also, if you have a new pinion nut, don't use it until the preload has been set. Use the old one to do all the on/off stuff while setting the preload. Anyway, that's my 2 cents worth. Good luck.

 

[XJensen]

My Rear End IsAt West Coast Now. They Do Great Work But Labor Rates Have Gone Up. i Paid $370 For A Locker Install, New Carrier Bearing, Pinion Seal And Bearings Pressed on the shafts theshafts

I Had Everthing But The Pinion Seal And The carrier bearings

 

[blondejoncherokee]

I think Jimmy, that used to run the service section, went back to sales, and they have a new guy running service. Jimmy used to hook it up with out of vehicle axles all the time. if he is gone, that is probably why, if he is not gone to sales yet, maybe they wont let him do that anymore...

 

[XJensen]

Yeah Jimmy Hook Me Up Last Time. New Guy running It Is mike

 

[XJensen]

Yeah Confirmed With Mike. Jimmy Was Giving Awayto Much And They Had A Business That Made No Money.

I Hate My Phone Now Pits Everything In Title Case......