mayor28

Back when I bought this car the PO told me that the rear would need to be reworked sometime in the future as he had not done this yet. What started as a simple brake rebuild (see here), lead to a discussion on differential rebuilds and plenty of other questions.

SO long story short, I pulled out the rear, a bit prematurely probably, but none the less. I called Mike and talked with him numerous times about all of my options. He was a great help with getting all of the parts off the car and with general vette knowledge (Thanks Mike!).

For the beter part of a year the car has sat on jack stands in the garage, .....until now.

Just before Christmas I crated up the differential and boxed up the two trailing arms and sent them on their way to Texas.








I also began degreasing the entire rear of the car, I plan on painting all of the chassis components with Extreme Chassis Black.

I am going to sand blast some more parts today and hopefully get them painted as well, something like this:



QUESTION: DO you think that I should paint the fiberglass around and above the differential (the batt box and glove and jack storage)?????? Does anyone have a pic of them painted?

Thats all for now, I should have some more pics after today!

C3 4ME

I believe those parts stayed bare fiberglass. If so, I'd leave them. JMO, but I can't stand seeing an engine compartment, or under car where it looks like someone just set off a black paint bomb and EVERYTHING got painted black. I like some contrast.

mayor28

I like the contrast too, maybe a diferent color, or maybe all it needs is a little cleaning.....

I live in you sister city in MD......

rosslato

i painted mine which turned out to be a nice background for everything.

mayor28

I sent this photo to Mike for a color scheme, black i& silver nstead of red, but the same scheme........

mayor28

Update:
I did a little sand blasting on the parts that I didn't send out to Mike. Found out that my compressor was not powerful enough to run a pot blaster, so I need to find another way to get the parts blasted......

Anyways, I took the U-Joints out of the diff-side of the trailing arms, but I couldn't get them out of the spindle side....any tips to get these out? It looks like the diff side was replaced at some point but the spindle side looks much older.....



Here is how I got the joints out, if anyone is interested:









I also undercoated the passenger side wheel well today....pics later.

QUESTION:
1. What is the safest way to remove the ujoint from the spinde side of the half shaft?
2. I need to blast the half shafts and drive shaft, but since i removed the ujoints, do I need to tape off this area? I assume the answer is yes, and I hope that the best answer is to leave the joints in while blasting......

mayor28

Undercoat:

mayor28

Anyone know?

SIXFOOTER

Remove the circlips in the picture and tap the U-Joint out same way you did the other end

Street Rat

What gear ratio did you decide on?

Mike is the man!

mayor28

Car had 3.36 in it......was going to put the same back in.

I talked to Mike for a long while about gearing options, and I think with the motor plans that I have (is not that much), 3.36 should be good. I gave some thought to 3.55, but I am not swapping the trans out anytime soon so higher ratio didn't really make sense.....

manofsteel1

explain how by hitting those joints out made them come out,please. go to a 3:08 rear, better gas mph

mayor28

By placing the ujoint trunnions on the jaws of the vise and then using a socket that was big enough to allow the joint cap to fit inside, you are using the inner trunnion to drive out the cap........that is probably confusing, but I watched this
Hope that helps......

mayor28

Okay, so I have run into a problem and could really use some advice. When I was taking out the rear cross member (nearly a year ago ) I sheared off the driver side bolt . On top of that the car side mount is atrocious looking:



I hit it with a die grinder and a fine sand paper pad, now it looks like this:




QUESTION:
Any thoughts on how to drill out the bolt that is broke off? I gound t down a little, but I think my helper from awhile back tried to drill it out and failed......


.

mayor28

???

gcusmano74

You need to be quite careful when pressing the U joint out of the spindle flange. The flange is very easy to bend. Bolt a backing plate to the flange before you remove the U joint.
Look at the Eckler's 88-0373-1.

mayor28

Since this would ammount to a single use tool (which I frown on purchasing), is there some way to do this (safely) with something I may have around the garage?

I think I have heard it is okay to leave the spindle side attached to press the joint out, but alas those are in Texas.......

mayor28

Ttt

mayor28

Update:

Mike is working on the differential (should have it back by the end of February!)! In the meanwhile, I have been working on the rest of the rear, trying to make sure I am ready to go when I get the trailing arms and diff back from Mike.

Here is how the rear looks as of today:





I was able to get the stuck u joints pressed out of the half shafts today as well!


But I still have this problem to deal with:



Anyone got any good thoughts about this?


I also bought some components to make my own adjustable strut rods:



I had a little help from a friend today too......


What does everyone think? I am planning on painting the battery/glove box tubs a very dark gray, that color is just a primer.....


.

mds3013

I think you have a cute puppy! Also, ask MIKE about the bolt. He is your best resource, mike...

Mine below... Tracdogg2 taught me also.