Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2004 19:52:52 -0400
Reply-To: Jason Willenbrock <pooncerelli@HOTMAIL.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Jason Willenbrock <pooncerelli@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: 87 syncro westy maiden voyage and bad news
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed
hey all,
i just got back from the maiden voyage with my 87 syncro westy project. i
drove from west fork MT to Bozeman MT round trip. results were 500 total
miles, 18 average MPG (better then i thought it would get!) and she drove so
smooth through snow and mud and hummed beautifully on the highway. well,
once i reached bozeman i felt the binding of my rear wheels on very tight
turns. after reading derek drews posts on the syncro.org webpage i knew my
vc must be on its way out. i let the van sit over night and the next day
she was fine on tight turns, that is until i drove home and after 4 hours of
highway driving, i finally made a tight turn into a gas station. severe
binding or scrubbing occured. fortunately i was pretty much home at this
point so no further driving was necessary. i am guessing it has to be the
vc. here is my thoughts, when i first bought this van to restore back in
august the cvs were the first thing i removed to inspect. the rear cvs were
very badly damaged. the cage in the cv's which hold the balls in place, was
cracked and ready to disinegrate. i had no idea why. well, now i know, the
PO must have been driving her on a bad vc and allowed the binding to occur
so much that it wrecked these cv joints. is that normal for a bad vc to do
that? well, i have since replaced those cv's but now when i felt the
binding, i had thought i could hear some popping or cracking going on back
there, could this be my cvs?
i am now going to take Derek Drew's advice and remove the center drive shaft
so i can atleast drive the van until i can afford a new vc. can i still
use rear diif lock?
my question is this: how do i get the bolts loose from the drive shaft? i
can not get a wrench, or socket to seat in the bolt itself where it connects
to front diff. the nut i can get my socket wrench on, but only with a elbow
or univeral joint attached to the wrench. well, with this tool setup i am
looking at potentially stripping something out. it seems so easy but i can
not get the tools to work for me here. any special tools? any help? who has
done this and has a fool proof method to give me before i strip something.
also, bentely says to loosen the front diff mounts, is this necessary?
TIA
jason
87 syncro westy project
90 gl 4 sale
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