Front driver side wheel rotation question.

[blackdout]

This may be a dumb question, but if anyone can explain this to me, I would appreciate it. When I was replacing my front brakes I noticed that my passenger side wheel would rotate fairly freely by hand. When I jacked the driver side up (I have to jack one side up at a time because of the lift), I noticed that my driver side could only rotate about 90^ total, or 45^ forward and 45^ backwards, before it seemed to "hit" something, and become hard to continue rotating (taking quite a bit of force to push through the "hit" point). There was an audible clunk when it "hit", and it seemed to be coming from the front diff.

Is this the Eaton? If this is normal, why does it only "hit" or "clunk" on the driver side and not the passenger? If it is abnormal, what should I be looking into? It seems to be driving fine, I just replaced the pitman and idler arms and had it aligned, and there is no noticeable pull that I would expect if this was occurring at every wheel rotation while driving.

Additional note: There was no play in the wheel from 12-6 o'clock or from 9-3 o'clock, and the hub seemed fine. Additionally, this "hit" happened with the brakes completely off as well.

I would appreciate any lessons the Jedi of this forum have for me on this.

Cheers!

 

[SunlitComet]

no locker up there but when 4wd front axle actuator is disengaged, the right wheel has just the shaft to spin and that is it. the front driveshaft should be stationary and as a result will hold the ring gear and differential carrier still. so with the spider gears being held in position the left wheel will turn its axle and differential side gear causing the stationary spider gears to spin the right side gear in the opposite. it does no harm because the right side gear is disconnected from the right output shaft.

your right wheel has less resistance to fight then your left. i cant tell myself how much force you used to turn, but it honestly sounds like the gear teeth bumping each other as you move the assembly back and forth by means of the wheel(or brake assembly).

My suggestion is if you have no noise issues and no pull issues, it is acting just how it is expected to act. if you can manage to get the whole rear axle off the ground, you would have the same effect but by design either wheel will do it. tho i would have the fluid checked. it is very easy to overlook the fluid inspections on axle assemblies.

Jedi has spoken.

 

[blackdout]

Thank you Master

One note though, there is an Eaton (TruTrack if I remember right) in the front, it's been quite a few years (9?) since I installed them along with the gears... and I can't remember if I did M-Locker or TruTrack.

Will be doing the fluids and can check for sure then, but that is waiting until I decide on which Redline oil weight I want... may have to crack them open and find out what traction control unit I threw in there before I order though... catch 22 if I want to drive her!

Thanks again! I see you're in Pittsburg, I work in Antioch for the time being. May have to pick your brain on CARB legal Headers at some point!