The front one is more worn than the rear. They were done by a professional driveline shop ~25K miles ago. Not sure the brand.
I've been greasing them regularly with Redline CV-2
The rear U joint is a conversion U joint, as I changed from the stock chrysler 8 3/8 axle to a Chrysler 9.25, which has larger Yoke.
Anybody know off hand which conversion U joint this would be or how to determine which?
I was wondering at what i consider to be the short lifespan of the joints. I suspect the driveshaft might be out of balance, or my rear airbags and ability to change rear ride height puts more stress on the U joints.
I did recently put about 1600 miles on them with about 2 inches more rear ride height than level, and shortly after the road trip is when I heard the low bearing type rumble on Decel sub 15mph which once before, proved to be the U joints.
I also had issues with redline CV-2 not being compatible with the grease whcih came in my ball joints. It degelled. i wonder if grease in teh U joints was also partially from improper lubrication.
I've never done U joints myself. These have the innner clips.
One more question is that my drive shaft is pretty rusty. if I take it out and to a driveline shop for balancing and new joints, is it worth me treating the rust and painting it myself, or pay them to do it? Any Idea of cost?
I've no idea if the driveshaft is really out of balance, only a suspicion due to the short life of the U joints.
Worn out driveshaft U joint at <25K miles
- Thread starter wrcsixeight
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Its probably a Moog. They make conversion joints. Its probably going from a 1330 to a 1350 size joint which I know they make and I used one for a very short period of time.
You need to measure the angle of your driveshaft at both extremes of your suspension. If you get more than about 1.5 degrees, the u joint life drops dramatically.
If it is, you may need to engineer the driveline for better angle or possibly put in some sort of CV.. It might also be possible to change the angle of the engine/trans to work with the shaft angles better.
If its under 1.5 degrees, then its probably a shoddy joint. What I would do (and of course, its easy to spend other's money) is have the driveline shop take your driveshaft, cut the yoke off the end and weld on a new yoke that matches the larger u-joint size on the axle. Then install a Dana Spicer SEALED u-joint. If done propely and installed correctly a sealed Spicer joint will be basically a lifetime part as long as the angles are kept in check.
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Sorry, I was off, its 3 degrees on that chart, not 1.5 I believe. Its oddly offset makes it a little hard to tell. Everytime I said 1.5 just put 3 in there instead.
AZjeff
$50 Site Donor 2023
What life did you get out of the original joints? Was there an operational reason to run it that far lifted 2"? It doesn't seem that 2" would change your angles 3 deg or more.
I've had Moog/ Precision ones fail that quickly. OE ones lasted 130k miles with the same amount of lift. Running NEAPCO ones now on recommendation of a local driveshaft shop, he said he's had bad luck with Spicers recently since they started off-shoring.
Originally Posted By: Linctex
Originally Posted By: HoosierJeeper
he said he's had bad luck with Spicers recently since they started off-shoring.
I don't know if it's all of them or just certain lines, but he really recommended the Neapcos so that's what I'm running.
Nick1994
$100 site donor 2023
When did you get them installed?
I had U joints done on my Jeep at a driveline shop and I think I got a 3 year warranty.
I just bought the Ujoints and took the driveshaft to my normal guy. It was last spring.
The U joints are long long out of any time warranty. Excepting road trips I do not put much more than 2.5K miles a year on the vehicle.
The road trip which I had raised the rear ride height a bit, was because it was feeling squishy back there. That was a tire issue. They had just turned 6 and did not like 395 in august. I;d forgotten to lower the rear once I got new tires. My bad.
The angles do not seem excessive to me, not even with 100 PSI in the air bags, and they lift the rear nearly 5 inches higher, than at 5 PSI.
Perhaps the redline CV-2 being high moly and perhaps not compatible with the grease installed at the factory caused failure by improper lubrication, or the needle bearings sliding instead of rolling due to the moly. or perhaps the U joints are just junk.
I think they are GMB. I got a lot of other things that come first right now before I deal with this, but am just trying to get everything in place in my mind for a proper durable repair. I'll likely not be exceeding 45MPH anytime soon.
Regarding longevity of previous U joints, The front U joint had about 45K miles on it when replaced. The rear one, all I know is it had more than ~60K miles on it, and could have been original and 185K total.
When the rear U joint wore out the last time there was the bearing noise on Decelleration, that I thought was the Diff. The Diff was worn, and replaced, but rusty diagonal roller bearings in the U joint Caps pointed to it as being the noise culprit.
I have developed same noise now, but hear it at slightly slower speeds. The front U joint has obvious play in both directions, and one set of caps gets hotter than the other according to my IR gun.
The rear U joint has some play on one set of caps, none on the other, and also has a 10 degree difference on cap temperature, but the pinion housing itself was hotter than the U joint caps.
The 9.25 axle was rebuilt professionally when the U joints were replaced ~25K miles ago.
I do not expect to do any offroading and submerging of the joints, but I did so in Baja just before I developed the bearing rumble on Decel 25K miles ago.
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