Dana 30 gear install

[thomasxj97]

Hey everyone,  

over the weekend  I broke off about ten teeth on my  ring gear in the front end of my  jeep.  The thing that sucks is i only had the gears in for about 2 months.  I am wondering if anyone in the club would know how to set a ring and pinion and if they would be willing to teach me.  I talked to Eric a long time ago, but  i guess he is really busy.  I would be willing to pay whom ever can help me out.  I just know something like this will happen again in the future so i would love to fix it myself in the future. I can take apart the front diff in about an hour and put everything in another hour, I just have never set a ring and pinion before. If there are nay special tools to measure the backlash I will buy that too, so that will not be an issue.   I think this time I will go with Yukon or superior gears.  I do not think i will trust motive ever again, plus they are made in Korea, while Yukon are make in Italy, and i think Superior are made in America.

I hope someone can help.

Gordon  

[MrMindless]

What gears are you running, and what size tires? Pretty important questions before potentially throwing good money after bad.

Special tools needed are a mic or calipers to measure shim thickness, inch-pound torque wrench to measure pinion preload, and dial indicator and magnetic base to measure backlash.  If you\'re starting from 0 I\'d guess you\'d be looking at $2-300 in tools to buy new.

I don\'t think anyone in the club has a shop up and running at the moment to do this sort of work. As you found Erik is pretty busy, Ryan doesn\'t have a shop anymore and Smike and I are both driveway mechanics too. Chip is still getting set up in his new space, I\'m sure it\'ll take a while for him to get settled in.

The weather doesn\'t look too stellar for hard work half tucked in a garage, but if it needs doing it needs doing!

[thomasxj97]

oh well i dont need a shop to fix it.  i took out the ring gear in a gravel driveway in an hour so thats no problem where its done i just need someone who knows how, and can show me. it should only take between 3 and 5 hours at most anywho.  I have 4.56 gears and im running 35\" tires.  i figures the axle shaft would break way before the ring gear would. I am hoping to swap in a dana 44 someday, but for now im just making due with the dana 30 high pinion reverse rotation axle.   im guessing  the gear was bad quality or was not meshing right. it will be about a week or two before i get the new ring and pinion set.  

[MrMindless]

You\'re right that you should be breaking shafts first.  Poor quality gear or poor setup most likely.  The teeth still on the ring gear may give an indication of pattern and if it was poor to begin with.

Two years ago we had a bunch of club members wasting 4.88 D30 R&Ps, it seems the pinion just gets too small and even quality gears were having teeth cleaned off.  I don\'t expect that you should see continued issues with quality 4.56s though.

[Ryan_25]

I broke 4.88s Smike did also and Mike Wolfe broke I think 4.56. Dana 30 will always have gear problems. 35s and a locker are not easy on them.

[rejeep]

Knock on wood...
My 30 has been ok with 410 aussi and 35\'s
I do run chromo shafts.... But I know I\'m on borrowed time..

I would like to have my jeep regeared.. But I have been having problems finding a shop locally tha can do the work...

[crisco]

I am a machinist so I have all the tools needed and a pretty well setup garage, if you need some help.
I haven\'t done gears before but with the right tools, and the internet anything is possible.

I don\'t come on here alot so email me if you want
Vernon   M5   at yahoo