Catastrophic U-Joint Failure

[Cannonball89]

I got the Spicer U-Joints in the other day, so this morning I took them to my local transmission repair shop, which is a pretty neat, old fashioned machine shop. But anyways, it turns out that the slip yoke for the transmission got twisted as well so I need to replace that piece too

 

Fortunately I have the driveshaft off of the 280zx that I sourced my engine and transmission from, so I'm hoping that we can remove the staked-in U-Joints from that shaft and take the slip yoke off of it to adapt to my driveshaft. As long as that slip yoke isn't worn inside the journals for the U-Joints, it should work. I'll find out tomorrow morning.

[rejracer]

It can be done, but our local drive line shop prefers to just buy the right slip yolk due to the labor cost involved in converting a new style slip yolk to accept the old U-joints. I'm curious to hear what your shop says.

Edited April 27, 2012 by rejracer

[Cannonball89]

I wasn't able to talk to him until this morning, but he said that it the slip yoke on my 280zx driveshaft isn't machined with a place for the Circlips to sit, so I'm ordering a new slip yoke. It's part number 1203-26S from PTI.

 

In the future I'm going to have a driveshaft made with 1310 U-Joints, I think I know where to get all the parts I need. I will start a thread detailing that when it starts to happen.

Edited May 1, 2012 by Cannonball89

[Bernardd]

@ Cannonball, did you get your ujoint issues figured out? I tore mine up yesterday at the track. Would you install the 1310's on a stock 240z driveshaft or should I use the larger 280 turbo driveshaft I have holding the floor down?

[280Zhunter]

I just ordered two of the Spicer 5-1501X joints.

 

Spicer seems to have a very good reputation. Almost every forum I've snooped around on seems to recommend them, especially the offroading forums. In spite of the grease fittings, I'm hoping they hold up better.

 

I'm probably going to replace the U-Joints in my half-shafts at the same time, and I'll report back some results after the next time I go to the track.

 

 

Hello, was wondering where you bought the Spicer U-joints?? If you look at the stock joints, driveshaft or halfshaft, you should see a plug screwed into 1 corner of the cross(centered). It's so you can unscrew it and put in a zerk fitting to grease the U-Joints after which you remove the fitting and REPLACE the plug for clearance. The Spicer joint fitting is OFFSET and should be installed so it is further away from the flange(towards center of shaft) also orient the fittings so they're 180 deg(half turn) away from each other. The needle bearings in a Spicer joint are also much larger than stock. You could also consider having just the crosses CRYOED to strengthen them. The Spicer joints needed for the halfshafts are (5-1505X), I need just 2 if you could steer me to a source I would appreciate it. THANKS and GOOD LUCK!

[Xnke]

I'm bringing this back as I'm about to have a driveshaft built with the Spicer 1310 U-joints, and these are the part number for parts that I plan to use.

The diff flange for an R180 or Z-car R200 is a PTI PN 3201-39...this crosses to spicer too, I think

 

The slip yoke is a Spicer PN 2-3-13461X for the Z trans OR the 240SX transmission

 

The driveshaft weld yokes for 2" diameter 0.083" wall tubing are Neapco N2-28-357, and you'll need 2

 

Then some 2"OD, 0.083" wall thickness DOM tubing and a welder and you're ready to rock and roll.