Cautionary note: you can bend these things with a big hammer.
[EDIT] - Figuring out if I need to tear it all out and start over, including the diff. Opinions vary as you will see below. Short version of learning is that you should most likely never need to hammer the axle home and that you should most likely probably not have to hammer the birf/axle to set the axle into the oil seal. If you do, and you are me, you may have ****ed everything or nothing and it is no big deal.
I am rebuilding the knuckles on the front of my car and today was finally putting everything back together. I thought I would be safe hammering the axle home to set it in the oil seal because it was hardened steel. Well it is not that hard and my sledge needed to really wail on it to get it to set. It is actually quite tricky, you have to hold the birfield in one hand to make sure it is aligned straight and then with the other swing a sledge hard to drive it home to seat. Dumb move, don’t be like me and always hit into brass or a wood block, not the steel. It mushroomed the end ever so slightly now so that the splines don’t register on the end.
I was so close to the finish line on this huge project and I just ****ed it on the two yard line. Now I need to source and buy a new bird, uninstall everything, pull the short axle out, install a new birf, and then reinstall and retorque. Needless waste,
I borrowed a Dremal and by hand remained the splines on the end so that there was enough clearance to finish out the install but my handmade splines are not perfect.
[EDIT] - Figuring out if I need to tear it all out and start over, including the diff. Opinions vary as you will see below. Short version of learning is that you should most likely never need to hammer the axle home and that you should most likely probably not have to hammer the birf/axle to set the axle into the oil seal. If you do, and you are me, you may have ****ed everything or nothing and it is no big deal.
I am rebuilding the knuckles on the front of my car and today was finally putting everything back together. I thought I would be safe hammering the axle home to set it in the oil seal because it was hardened steel. Well it is not that hard and my sledge needed to really wail on it to get it to set. It is actually quite tricky, you have to hold the birfield in one hand to make sure it is aligned straight and then with the other swing a sledge hard to drive it home to seat. Dumb move, don’t be like me and always hit into brass or a wood block, not the steel. It mushroomed the end ever so slightly now so that the splines don’t register on the end.
I was so close to the finish line on this huge project and I just ****ed it on the two yard line. Now I need to source and buy a new bird, uninstall everything, pull the short axle out, install a new birf, and then reinstall and retorque. Needless waste,
I borrowed a Dremal and by hand remained the splines on the end so that there was enough clearance to finish out the install but my handmade splines are not perfect.
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