Carrier Bearing ?

[JCA1972]

I have a 71 C-10 with the 2 pice drive shaft, I'm wanting to change out the carrier bearing, I looked at it and cant figure out how to change it, Can someone please tell me how to do this. thanks.

[grayw0lf]

There's a large bolt holding on the yoke. You'll have to remove that middle u-joint to get the bolt out. Remove the bolt & yoke & the bearing should slide right off.

[JCA1972]

Originally Posted by grayw0lf

There's a large bolt holding on the yoke. You'll have to remove that middle u-joint to get the bolt out. Remove the bolt & yoke & the bearing should slide right off.

Thanks, for your help.

[Hawker7]

You will probably need to make up some sort of puller to get the yoke off. Just did mine last, and the bearing did not slide off and I'm still trying to find a way to remove it. Maybe you will have better luck then me with the bearing though.

[eightbanger]

Did mine a short time ago, I removed the rear half of the D/S then undid the two bolts on the carrier (mine was the horse shoe type) and slid the front half of the D/S back and out through the cross member. It has been said that a press is needed to remove and install carrier bearings...that is true up to a point, though I was able to remove and install mine with some carefull but persuasive hammering. I was not woried about the removal of the old one so much as that was going in the bin...but I took a lot more time and care to fit the new one.

[71meangreenc10]

I just did the horseshoe type and I used an angle grinder with cutoff wheel (carefully) to remove the old one and then used a piece of 1 1/2 plastic PVC pipe with a hammer to install the new one, the PVC wont damage the bearing on install. I cut a piece about 2 feet long and it was painless. 1 1/2 PVC fits perfect on the bearing.

Smitty

[davebloomer]

just did mine on the side of the road three days ago... like stated take it all off, remove middle u joint then unbolt the bolt holding the yoke on.. I used the bigger hammer method after taking out the bolt. The yoke then came off and went back on very easy... Have fun with the pins in your U joints... I HATE those things.

[JCA1972]

Thanks for the advice guys, I just ordered a new one from Manes trucks, it should be in in a few days.

[grayw0lf]

Yeah, maybe my carrier bearing did "slide right off" with the help of my hyd press.

[Ed 72 Sierra Grande]

Thanks for the help and advice. Did mine today. If yours is tough to get out like mine,

Get the 7 ton 2 jaw gear puller from sears. make sure it has 8" of reach or you have the wrong one. $39.99. Worked like a charm. picking up bearing tomm and using the pvc trick like mentioned above. thanks

[71meangreenc10]

Good stuff....

Smitty

[68 IRON]

Perfect timing guys....I was thinkin' about doing this!

[Ryan5O]

I just installed a new one a week ago. Had a friend lend a hand and I think it took us almost two hours. Neither of us had done it before and we had to use alot of "persuasion" to get the old bearing off. Careful with the needle bearings when you take apart the ujoint and be ready for a little fluid when you get the drive shaft out. The new carrier bearing fit pretty snug and solved a squeaking issue I has having. Good luck.

[brad_man_72]

wow 10 post about changing carrier bearings with no mention of marking the shafts and yokes so you can put your driveshaft back together and have some chance of it being kinda ballanced. I say kinda because even if it went bak together perfectly you can bend the shaft removing or installing the bearing and the ujoint won't be eactly where it was.

the needles are alot easier to handle if you grease the joint first.
why did you need to replace the bearing in the first place? Ballance.....
2 piece drivelines are ballanced as an assembly and are very sensitive to any changes.

off my soap box...... Again!

[Ryan5O]

Your right about the marks. Probably the most important step. I wonder if you didnt mark the shafts, if its possible to to even get it totally assembled back together? If you have both drive shafts connected with one end in the tranny, Im willing to bet that the other end wouldnt assemble correctly. Then trying to get it lined up right it would turn into a guessing game.

[eightbanger]

OK! correct me someone if I'm wrong but I have no idea why you would need to mark the DS before removal in order to reinstall, I have a two piece DS with the horseshoe style CS mated to a TH400, and no matter how many times I've taken mine out....and I've lost count, it can only go back the same way it came out.

The forward half connects to the output shaft on the tranny which is splined so that has no relevance on direction, only when you fit the CS to that half are you governed which way on it needs to go i.e with the CS installed it can only go on one way with the mounting face & holes of the CS facing up to bolt to the cross member, so no marking required for that.

The rear half of the DS again has one splined end which connects both halves together, and the other has the UJ which connects to the yoke on the differential, so the only thing here is to marry up your UJ with the yoke then slip the splined end onto the forward half & pop the UJ into place.

Then there is the fact that the shaft is balanced, well that has about the same bearing in all this as removing your front wheels which are balanced, but you don't mark them before removal.
Maybe it's different for a manual transmission...I don't know, but this is how it is for mine.

[Ryan5O]

When I changed mine, I already had the two DS connected prior to installing the forward end into the tranny. On the tranny end, the DS can only go in one way because the splines are notched different sizes. Once the DS is in the tranny, then Im committed to install the other end of the DS into the differential at that specific position. The problem you may run into at that point is the splines on the differential end may not line up. If you scratch/or paint a mark prior to taking it apart you can eliminate this issue. At least thats the way I was taught.

[Ryan5O]

The marks show you the original position the DS fit into the tranny, the differential and how the u joint was assembled.

[capev86]

did the carrier bearing and all 3 u-joints on the 2 piece shaft on my 72 burb c20 a month or so ago. i put the truck on a drive on lift and took the whole shaft out as a unit so i could do it on a bench. i used a chalk pencil to mark every connection and since the wheels never moved i think i got it back on the same splines lined up again in the back of the trans. i actually pulled the shaft out of the back of the trans and rotate it one tooth so the back end of the shaft would rest evenly in the 2 u-bolts on the rear axle. i have a saginaw 3 on the tree and that may be different from other transmissions in terms of spline pattern (all the teeth are the same).

you have to pull the middle joint apart to get at the yoke keeping the carrier bearing on....unless you have a wrench that can fit down behind the joint. at this point i used a prick punch to make sure i had the mating splines on the yoke and shaft exactly right at reassembly. i put a CPP billet-poly mount in because even a new factory style unit is flimsy and loose. it should work on any truck where the two bolts holding it to the frame are in-line with the shaft. i think the 1 ton and/or leaf spring rear vehicles with 2 piece shaft use a unit where the 2 bolts are side by side.

[Pont406]

I did mine twice now under lifetime autone warranty.

[leddzepp]

Originally Posted by brad_man_72

wow 10 post about changing carrier bearings with no mention of marking the shafts and yokes so you can put your driveshaft back together and have some chance of it being kinda ballanced. I say kinda because even if it went bak together perfectly you can bend the shaft removing or installing the bearing and the ujoint won't be eactly where it was.

the needles are alot easier to handle if you grease the joint first.
why did you need to replace the bearing in the first place? Ballance.....
2 piece drivelines are ballanced as an assembly and are very sensitive to any changes.

off my soap box...... Again!

Best advice/insight I have read. Speaking from experience as well.

[brad_man_72]

sorry. It doesn't matter how thhe tranny yoke is in the trans or the rear joint in the pinion yoke. It matters how the actual piecces of the driveshaft are assembled. Just starting from the front on a ccomplete rebuild things that will kill the ballance.. Rotate the trans yoke 180*. I think theirs 5 poitions you can rotate the bolt on yoke. Rotate the rear shaft 180 to the front shaft, flip rear shaft from pinion to bolt on yoke (back to front). It's easy to do. This is assuming that you notice any parts that are ecessivly worn, the carrier bearing and yoke shouldn't just slide off, and ujoint caps shouldn't spin in the yokes.
I see professional MECHANICS Mess this up every week an I hear stories about how peoples carrier bearings don't last 6 months so they go buy a $100 billet poly bearing to mask most of the real problem.

[bollybib]

I wrote up my experience with the carrier bearing in Posts #72-74 of my Project thread. Like most have advised above, I marked everything for orientation before I removed and disassembled the driveshaft.

[no moa]

Mine was apart when I got it, no marks. Does anyone balance a 2 piece anymore?
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[eightbanger]

=eightbanger;4829928]The forward half connects to the output shaft on the tranny which is splined so that has no relevance on direction, only when you fit the CS to that half are you governed which way on it needs to go i.e with the CS installed it can only go on one way with the mounting face & holes of the CS facing up to bolt to the cross member, so no marking required for that.

Correction!....In my haste to explain how simple this task is I forgot that once the CS is installed on the DS it of course now spins as it's supposed to, therfore making it even simpler to install the forward half without the need for any orientation whatsoever.