mark forget the marks just tighten the nut with a impact till you feel some drag,once the tube is crushed you remove the nut to inst seal you only need to be sure the nut is reasonably tight,dont need to crush the tub just snugth nut a touch past wher it was.the tube crush  is pretty crude way to pre load a bearing. but is seems to work. home  give me a call when you ar up to a coffee cliff

I'll follow your instructions to the letter Pete.  Thank you very much.


Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Mark. The flange is indexed to the snout of the pinion so the splines are always in the same relative position. You want a preload of X inch pounds to turn the shaft after you replace the seal. To do this the quick and dirty way. You MARK the position of the large nut relative to the pinion shaft  so the same tension ( pre load) is reapplied on reassembly. USE GOOGLE YOUTUBE and watch some videos if this is still not clear. Ignore the NOISE and good intensions. Pete
PS, The final tension is 175 to 225 FOOT LBS so you have to hold the yoke while you tighten the nut. Use a fixture of some sort. After you tighten and line up the marks you made BEFORE you disassembled it. Then the torque to rotate the yoke is 8 to 10 INCH LBS

Second PS. The witness marks are one on the large nut holding the the yoke to the pinion shaft. And one on the snout of the pinion shaft to show how tight the nut was torqued at last assembly.

Thanks CK.  The Tbirds, Station Wagons, Sedan Deliveries, Pickups came with the stronger Dana 44.  The cars came with the banjo style with the removable center section like a 9".  I forgot that you were working on a Dana 44 when I asked for your advice.  Sorry for the confusion.
Thanks.


Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Well i am not to sure if the pinion even had a collapsible spacer and the only tension at present is the lock of the nut.
I tightened it by feel, as i did my apprenticeship reconditioning diffs. Lots of 9" fabrications.
I also recently bought a 9" which i am converting to fit with 4 link.

So you are saying the 55 Tbirds were made with Dana and Banjo diffs.
my Tbird id says it was build no.247. maybe the early ones were built with the banjo.

I like the banjo style diffs to recondition. working on the bench is much easier than under the car.
It was such a smelly Job.   

Pete, just to be clear, I mark the pinion flange and the nearest thread on the pinion with a center punch and then return the flange and nut to the same position and pay no attention to the torque value?  In order for this to happen I think the flange would have to be lined up with the splines as it came off - or am I missing something.

Mark

Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Mark, The shop manual assumes that the preload was correct from the factory or re-build and you mark the positions ( witness mark) to get that crush, pre load back. It does not address the spline location. Pete

CK, I am now the proud owner of 2 center sections for the '55 '56 rear ends.  One 3.70:1 and the other 3.89:1.  Swapping center sections on these rears is fairly easy so I can see which one I like better.  I am curious about the installation of a new Pinion Seal in the '55'56 rear end.  The shop manual tells me to "Mark the position of the universal joint flange, nut, and pinion shaft with a punch to obtain the same pre-load when assembling the unit."  I am not sure where the marks should be placed. I think that the purpose of the marks is to ensure that the universal joint flange is matched spline for spline with its original position and to ensure that the nut is re-tightened to the same torque as it was found.  How does one know that the preload on a 60 year old rearend is correct as found.  This process seems to me that it could be a tad imprecise

Thanks.


Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Easy way to know what your rear end gear ratio is when everything is installed ( not the case here ) is to jack up the rear end ,put a mark on the drive shaft , turn rear wheel a full complete turn ( 360 ) and count the revolutions of the drive shaft. example :  one  full turn wheel turn = 3.5 drive shaft turns = 3.50 gears
giddy up, Carson

Learned something, thought all dana's were rear loading. Now I know.

Frank/Rebop

Bristol, In ( by Elkhart)