Stripping Down the Back Axles
(14/03/2007)
After picking up the donor pack from Tiger on the Saturday morning, I decided to take my final days leave of the year later in the week and set about getting the axles stripped down. Fortunately the Avon does not require the entire mass of the sierra layout, it favours a more elegant fully independent arrangement, this saves quite a lot of weight, so the only parts I would be reusing we the differential, driveshafts, hubs and the drum back plates.
First task was to give everything a really good soaking in WD40. These axles have been stored outside exposed to the elements for quite some time, as the pictures show they have become quite corroded and very agricultural looking! The hub nuts would be especially difficult to crack, even more so as there isn't the weight of the car to use as leverage and stop the hubs moving round.
Next task was to remove the prop shaft drive plate, when it was removed from the car it was simply cut through, its held on with 4 small bolts, you have to brace the universal joint to stop the differential from spinning.
Four bolts hold the differential to the axle beams. Two are long bolts that pass through the centre of the diff and bear the main load. The other two are smaller bolts that hold the front of the diff. These were all in pretty tight, so I needed to use a breaker bar to get them off, the long bolts required the use of a percusive maintenance device (hitting it with a hammer), and a drift to push the bolt out the other side of the diff. Once free of the axle, the diff can be removed, the drive shafts simply push in to the diff on this model. Remember to remove the rubber mounting bush from the back of the diff, this is not required.
To make things easier, I decided to move the upper portion of the axles, this would help me later on getting each hub into a vice to undo the hub nut. This is done by removing the 4 mounting bolts, again the use of a breaker bar was required as they are torqued quite highly and a lot of thread lock has been used. The upper portion simply lifts away, splitting the remaining wishbones into two sections. These are now big enough to man-handle into a vice.
To remove the drive shaft, hub and back plate from the wishbones the main hub nut has to be undone. This is made much more difficult because, firstly the hubs aren't mounted to the car, and these nuts are notoriously difficult to get undone. Secondly it is a problem because Ford in their infinte wisdom, decided to use a whacking great socket that I don't have. A 41mm socket is needed for the nut, and i've had tremendous difficulty in locating one. Suffice it to say its going to be a few days before I can get one sent, so poor old Raf has to put up with more rusting metal in his garden for a bit longer. More on getting these monsters apart in another post.
After picking up the donor pack from Tiger on the Saturday morning, I decided to take my final days leave of the year later in the week and set about getting the axles stripped down. Fortunately the Avon does not require the entire mass of the sierra layout, it favours a more elegant fully independent arrangement, this saves quite a lot of weight, so the only parts I would be reusing we the differential, driveshafts, hubs and the drum back plates.
First task was to give everything a really good soaking in WD40. These axles have been stored outside exposed to the elements for quite some time, as the pictures show they have become quite corroded and very agricultural looking! The hub nuts would be especially difficult to crack, even more so as there isn't the weight of the car to use as leverage and stop the hubs moving round.
Next task was to remove the prop shaft drive plate, when it was removed from the car it was simply cut through, its held on with 4 small bolts, you have to brace the universal joint to stop the differential from spinning.
Four bolts hold the differential to the axle beams. Two are long bolts that pass through the centre of the diff and bear the main load. The other two are smaller bolts that hold the front of the diff. These were all in pretty tight, so I needed to use a breaker bar to get them off, the long bolts required the use of a percusive maintenance device (hitting it with a hammer), and a drift to push the bolt out the other side of the diff. Once free of the axle, the diff can be removed, the drive shafts simply push in to the diff on this model. Remember to remove the rubber mounting bush from the back of the diff, this is not required.
To make things easier, I decided to move the upper portion of the axles, this would help me later on getting each hub into a vice to undo the hub nut. This is done by removing the 4 mounting bolts, again the use of a breaker bar was required as they are torqued quite highly and a lot of thread lock has been used. The upper portion simply lifts away, splitting the remaining wishbones into two sections. These are now big enough to man-handle into a vice.
To remove the drive shaft, hub and back plate from the wishbones the main hub nut has to be undone. This is made much more difficult because, firstly the hubs aren't mounted to the car, and these nuts are notoriously difficult to get undone. Secondly it is a problem because Ford in their infinte wisdom, decided to use a whacking great socket that I don't have. A 41mm socket is needed for the nut, and i've had tremendous difficulty in locating one. Suffice it to say its going to be a few days before I can get one sent, so poor old Raf has to put up with more rusting metal in his garden for a bit longer. More on getting these monsters apart in another post.
The completed axles ready for dismantling
The wishbones and hubs after the diff and top section have been removed
My Scrap yard!
The axles top section removed and both differentials.
The difficult rear hub nut!
A very sorry looking differential, removed from the axle
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