U-joint replacement

[jz57]

Don't mass around Aluminum driveshaft with u-joints. The yoke is easy to be deformed.

 

[mattjones]

What brand u-joints brand did you use?

Strong two year bump:

The new U joints were AC Delco and the old ones were factory original.

I ended up putting the old u joint (minus the plastic clips) back in since I couldn’t get it out of the yoke. I figured I’d need to drive it to a shop and pay a pro to replace them.

I’m not sure why, but the squeaking completely stopped. I’m thinking that maybe when I heated them up to get the plastic out it heated the grease and forced it into an area where it had dried out. I was a little worried about not having those plastic clips anymore but kept putting off going to the shop until I eventually just forgot about the whole U joint issue.

It’s been 30k miles since then and I haven’t had any u joint or driveshaft problems. I still have the brand new U joints though so I may try to replace them again next time I’m getting under the truck for anything and have access to a ball joint press or a vice or something.

 

[bottomline2000]

Strong two year bump:

The new U joints were AC Delco and the old ones were factory original.

I ended up putting the old u joint (minus the plastic clips) back in since I couldn’t get it out of the yoke. I figured I’d need to drive it to a shop and pay a pro to replace them.

I’m not sure why, but the squeaking completely stopped. I’m thinking that maybe when I heated them up to get the plastic out it heated the grease and forced it into an area where it had dried out. I was a little worried about not having those plastic clips anymore but kept putting off going to the shop until I eventually just forgot about the whole U joint issue.

It’s been 30k miles since then and I haven’t had any u joint or driveshaft problems. I still have the brand new U joints though so I may try to replace them again next time I’m getting under the truck for anything and have access to a ball joint press or a vice or something.

So you've been driving around for 2 years with nothing holding your ujoint caps in place? That's the purpose of the impregnated plastic. Given what could happen if your yoke came loose from the driveshaft, any amount of labor a shop charges to replace it is worth it..

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-T377A using Tapatalk

 

[mattjones]

So you've been driving around for 2 years with nothing holding your ujoint caps in place? That's the purpose of the impregnated plastic. Given what could happen if your yoke came loose from the driveshaft, any amount of labor a shop charges to replace it is worth it..

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-T377A using Tapatalk

Umm....basically, yeah.

I think those caps are practically fused to the yoke at this point. Between penetrating oil, C clamp, hammer, etc, I couldn't get the caps to budge at all.

I've actually spent most of the last two years deployed or in training and haven't really been able to do much work on the Hoe but now that I'll actually be home for an extended period of time I plan on doing a bunch of work on it this summer. I'm definitely gonna pull the driveshaft again and give the U joint another try.