You have three options, to install the carrier.
Before doing anything, try to get under car and pop off the differential cover rubber plug. If the plug is soft and pliable – then great, no further action needed. If it is rock hard or not soft/pliable, then get a replacement before doing repairs.
The rubber fill plug:
Dodge part number 3723687 (superseded to 5252504 and again to 52070428AA)
Dorman part number 090-062
Dorman Help part number 65293
Option One (replace the carrier by itself):
Note: you do not need to perform all of the FSM steps:
Axle shaft and bearings, removal and disassembly/Assembly and installation. The axles have to come out. The wheel bearings only need to be replaced if needed (feel rough or bearings are scored). I do recommend replacing both axle seals – even if they look OK.
Rear Axle Assembly – this section be skipped – unless you don’t want to work under the car (it is a lot more labor to remove the assembly than to fix the existing under car).
Differential Reconditioning, Removal and Disassembly: Perform steps 1 to 8. Skip steps 9 to 11. Perform steps 12 to first half of 16. You do not need to do second half of step 16 (to 20) unless needed to (and then you need to skip down to Option Two), steps 21 and 22. Skip steps 23 to 31.
Cleaning and inspection – perform all.
Assembly and installation, Skip steps 1 to 3 (unless your new carrier came dissembled), perform steps 4 to 9. Skip steps 10 to 28. Perform steps 29 to 31.
Perform all of: Differential Bearing Preload and Drive Gear Backlash.
Perform all of: Differential Side Gear Clearance Checking and Adjustment (which should be spot on sense it is a new carrier).
Gear Tooth Contact Pattern, Steps 1 to 4 can be skipped (if you want). Perform Step 5 to 10.
Now it is road test time!
My summary:
Before you start, get a (small) tube of Loctite blue (242) for later.
Press your new bearings (out of your differential bearing set) onto the new carrier. It doesn’t matter which side (same part for Left and Right sides).
Jack up car. Remove both rear tires/wheels – and leave brake drums, alone, for now.
Drain differential lube by removing the cover and having a catch can for the lube. Don’t reuse the lube.
With parking brake on, and car in park, loosen the 10 (or 12) ring gear bolts that hold ring gear onto the carrier. THESE BOLTS ARE LEFT-HAND THREAD! Just loosen them, for now.
Take parking brake off and remove brake drums.
Rotate carrier until you find the pin bolt. The pin is (or appears to be) chrome plated, it is 1” in diameter and about 6” long. I have seen several bolt head sizes of the pin bolt – but most common size is 3/8” (it will not be metric). Remove bolt and save. Slide the pin out. Generally rotating carrier some, the weight of pin will allow it to fall right out (don’t let pin fall to ground!).
Push in on one side axle shaft. It should push in about an inch or so.
Go back under car and get the C-clip for axle and put in a safe location.
Pull the same axle shaft straight out of car – using both hands (one on hub and other midway down on shaft). Avoid allowing axle shaft put any weight on the axle seal, if possible (it damages h axle seal).
Repeat for other side axle.
Once axle shafts are removed, wipe off the “chrome” appearing surface, somewhat close to the end of axle hub, with rag or towel. Feel with fingernail both the seal area and wheel bearing area. If either area can be felt by fingernail, then additional parts may be needed to finish job (see below).
Take a punch, or a letter or number punch and mark the two bearing caps, as to side and which side is up. Those bearing caps can go onto both sides. DO NOT GET CAPS ON WRONG OR YOU WILL HAVE PREMATURE BERARING FAILURE! What has worked for me is to put 1 punch mark on one side cap and housing and 2 punch marks on other side (so 6 punches total), either on top or on bottom side (bottom works better if under car).
Remove the adjuster ring locks and bolts (1/2” head, if I recall correctly) and save.
Remove the 4 large bolts holding the carrier bearing caps on. Remove caps with one hand while holding the carrier in place with the other hand. DO NOT GET THE BEARING CAPS REVERSED. The bolts do not matter too much as to which bolt goes where. The adjuster rings don’t care which side, either. The caps – do matter.
Having help for this step and previous step is helpful. If the carrier does not fall out, then take a large screwdriver and pry it out (but don’t pry on the gears!).
Tale carrier to your work bench and remove the ring gear bolts (the Left-hand tread bolts you loosened, earlier).
Generally, the ring gear needs a couple of love taps with brass or leather mallet to come off of the carrier. Have some wood blocks, or something, under the ring gear so it doesn’t hit anything hard. If ring gear doesn’t want to move – then install a couple of the Left hand thread bolts a few threads, then use same soft mallet and tap on the bolts – to push ring gear off. You do not want to mess up the ring gear bolt holes (or bolts).
Going back together:
They say to use new ring gear bolts every time. I haven’t ever had any problems reusing bolts before – so your call. If your kit came with bolts – then use the new ones.
It helps to have 2 or 3 pilot studs to help line up the ring gear.
That said – it is not easy to find Left-hand thread (well, anything) – so having pilot studs are very helpful – but good luck finding any or making some. The pilots are helpful but most times you can do the job without them
This next step helps if you can get wife and kids to take an extended trip, somewhere. If you get caught - I don’t want to say I didn’t warn you.
Take your “cleaned” ring gear and place on a metal cooking sheet. Place cooking sheet in oven to about the boiling point of water (or higher). How much temperature doesn’t matter a whole lot - other than don’t get over 300’ F – metal expands when hot and you need that expansion to get ring gear onto the new carrier. I have always done it at 250’ F (125’ C) and has had good results. Make sure your carrier is at room temperature before you start. Also take time to clean the "ring gear area" on new carrier so it will be free of oil or wax.
Using oven mitts, place the really hot ring gear onto the carrier (caution – you will get burnt without using “oven mitts”). Take a couple of your left-hand thread bolts and screw in until snug. Note: the bolts will get too hot to touch as well – much quicker than one would expect them to. At that point you can tighten the bolts down – or wait for things to cool down first (ie: remove any incrementing evidence from the kitchen and/or garage). Matter of fact, putting some cookies in the oven (not using same cooking sheet) – might make for a good distraction.
Once a few ring gear bolts are tight, I recommend removing all of the bolts (one at a time) and adding a drop of Loctite to the bolts as well to the carrier cap bolts, just before final torque.
The differential cap bolts torque is 100 foot-pounds (136 NM)
Ring gear bolts is 70 foot pounds (95 NM)
Pin bolt is 100 inch pounds (11 NM) – be absolutely sure you use Loctite on this bolt!
Cover bolts are 250 inch ponds (28 NM)
The new carrier should come with a new pin and pin bolt. I recommend saving your old ones for they can be hard to find, when needed).
All you would need to do next is to adjust the ring gear bearing preload and backlash (providing the pinion bearing preload is fine).
Full directions are at end of this post.
Option two (replace all bearings as well as carrier).
Here I would recommend taking car to a differential specialist to get done.
Option three (change out the ring and pinion gear set).
Again, I would recommend taking car to a differential specialist to get done.
One last thing. I do recommend also changing out the rear axle seals. It takes a slide hammer to pull them out, a block of wood and hammer to tap the seals back into place. The only difference is if axle shafts have a grove cut into them from old axle seals. If so, then don’t tap new seals in all of the way in – so seals ride on new axle surface.
If axles are grooved where the wheel bearings ride at – there is a fix for that, as well. There are offset wheel bearings to install that ride on a new axle surface. It takes a slide hammer to remove and install the wheel bearings, as well.
Tools needed:
Slide hammer with several attachments
SAE tools (nothing metric is inside of the differential)
A few wood blocks
A wooden, leather, plastic or rubber mallet – or last resort, a brass hammer
A dial indicator, with attachment parts.
A torque wrench, small and large. For bearing preload measurement – it is best to not use a click type torque wrench. The needle style works so much better. I have both click and needle styles in my tool box, on ¼”, 3/8” and ½”.
A large screwdriver or crow bar.
Angled C-clip pliers (for adjustment ring adjustment)
A small can or dish to place bolts into (magnetic plates/bowls work great)
A punch (or stamps)
A press (for bearing install)
Feeler gauges/thickness gauges (to confirm spider gear clearances).
The spider gear clearances should be spot on, sense this is a new carrier.
The tooth contact pattern should be unchanged once carrier bearing backlash and preload is setup. It doesn’t hurt to check the tooth contact pattern but not necessary just to replace the carrier. Sense the carrier is going to be replaced, checking carrier runout is also unnecessary. I highly doubt the new carrier is going to have any runout – unless it was dropped out of a truck a couple of times, ran over with a forklift, etc. Carrier runout is something I only see about 1% of the time (if that often).
The old carrier – in the North America, it is good to save all 4 spider gears and their washers – for those gears to occasionally to break, chip, etc. – and is nice to have on hand (for someone else). The gears will be different than what is in your new limited slip unit (vs. non-limited slip). In my opinion, I would say to just toss the old carrier and spider gears – for they are only worth their weight in whatever scrap iron is being bought for).
BudW
