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The T-bolts showed up for the rear end so my oldest son and I headed out to install some axles today. After about 2 minutes of working it became obvious why the PO used some shady bolts installed backwards (at an angle) to “secure” the flanges that hold the axle shafts in the housing. The T-bolts will not install with the old brake caliper flanges welded in place as there is not enough space to slide them in. Plasma cutter time? 3/8” will take forever with cut-off wheels.

IMG_8939.webp
 
kbahus said:
The T-bolts will not install with the old brake caliper flanges welded in place as there is not enough space to slide them in. Plasma cutter time? 3/8” will take forever with cut-off wheels.
Click to expand...

When you say plasma cutter, are you talking about cutting off the whole bracket or just places to get the hardware in?
Can you get in there with a burr bit and remove enough material to get the bolt through and a nut on the back?
 
Quite a bit of material needs to be removed to get them in, the picture is deceiving. My friend is going to bring his plasma cutter by and I am going to cut as much of the bracket off as I can. Now I just need to get this snow to stop so it can happen.
 
kbahus said:
Quite a bit of material needs to be removed to get them in, the picture is deceiving. My friend is going to bring his plasma cutter by and I am going to cut as much of the bracket off as I can. Now I just need to get this snow to stop so it can happen.
Click to expand...
How much snow are you getting up there?
 
Too much! We didn't get a ton from that last big storm, but we get hammered here with lake effect snow off Lake Michigan. Had a good 20-24" a few days ago, but it's getting packed down at this point. This winter has been the snowiest and coldest I can remember since moving here in 2014.
 
That lake effect snow is the real deal.

I have such memories of getting up early to deliver the Sunday Tribune. Open the garage door to start bagging them, and there are the bundles of papers with a foot or two of snow on top. Then Dad driving RWD 245 Volvo through all that snow while I sat in the back chucking papers out. Most of the time we were the first tracks on the street. The snow dust would roll back in the open tailgate and settle all over me. Cold and wet...

We need a big dump out here on the Front Range. Not much going on at all regarding snow pack...
 
My son helped put an axle in today, what a pain in the rear. In my head this was going to be easy, but as you can see there is no clearance between the axle flange and the parking brake assembly. This makes getting the spacer and retainer bracket in place extremely difficult. It also ruined my plan to use a crowsfoot to torque the other side down since that axle flange doesn’t have an access hole like this one. I am going to have to find a machine shop that can drill my other axle. I also hope the Hylomar sealed the flange because I don’t want to do this again!

IMG_9046.webp
 
Do you think that hole saw will go through a chromoly axle flange without a drill press?

It’s Ford Explorer parts, it will be fine :hillbilly:
 
Heck yes it’s a fighter! It wouldn’t be so bad if it was all Toyota lol

My Matco air compressor had a fatal incident. I usually turn it off but left it on because I was planning on coming back to the shop to work. Well a day later I open the door and the shop is full of smoke that smells like burning oil. I hear the compressor running so figured something was up. Oil and air was puking out of the head gasket and burning off because it was so hot, the pressure gauge is maxed out, and it’s leaking air out of the bottom. The pressure switch failed in the on position and turns out the prv didn’t work so it cracked the bottom of the tank. What a mess. Glad it wasn’t worse though!
 
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