TA

Let me first say that in the past whenever the Dana 36-durability polls came up I always chimed in and said that the 36 rear was fine............even with drag radials. I said this because I've probably had about 200+ 1/4 mile runs on 36s with more than half of them on drag radials, without a problem. Well today, I reserve the right to change that opinion. I was getting my car ready for this evening's ECS CC and was in the middle of a line-lock installation when I noticed something grossly wrong with my rear. I had noticed lately that I had been doing one-legged burnouts (ie. one tire spinning) so I had my mechanic put it on the lift to change the rear fluid, hoping to fix my problem. It ended up that my cluth pack had grenaded as evidenced by the metallic fluid we removed from the rear. That, however was not the big problem with my rear. With the car on the lift I noticed that the entire driver side of the rear cover was deformed and not at all straight, as it should be. Upon closer examination the "webbing" between the rails had completely broken and was barely holding the driver side portion of the rear together! Needless to say, I wasn't able to make it to the track and I'm now in need of a new rear which will, without a doubt, be for a D44. I will also, no longer, be condoning the use of a D36 with drag radials. Pictures to come soon

:cry :cuss :banghead:

StealDads67

Sorry to hear the bad news.. But think of how much worse it could have been... you could have made it to the track, paid addmisiion, then have it take a dump on the track.... The wouldnt have been good at all.... Good thing you caught it before it left you stranded, or a big oil patch at the tree.

Good luck with getting the D44 and get those 12s!!!

TA

You're absolutely right.......a tow back from the track would have been about $300, let alone the damage to the car that could have occured. Looks like it could be a bit longer to get to the 12s than I thought :sad: Anyway, here's the pic:

Alex D

That looks to me more like a damage from some other cause.
Besides the D44 won't help you there because the batwing webbing is the same as on the D36

MyBlueC5

Though I'm not that experienced with Corvettes per se, I can tell you that problems with rearends don't typically start until you start to hook up. As long as people are running street tires that will allow the tires to burn, almost any rearend will work fine. GM's 8 inch rearends, Ford's 28 spline axles, Dana 36's will stay together until you start to hook up whether it's from using drag radials or especially slicks.

Sorry to hear about your rear end. What gears did you have in it? Wanna sell them?

Mark

TA

The rear has 3.07 gears, but I'm not sure of the condition until I get the cover off. All I know at this point is the fluid that came out of that rear looked like liquid alluminum so I'm not holding my breath :crazy:

CFI-EFI

See my response to the identical post you left in the Drag Racing (?) section. That is NOT a Dana 36 weakness, you have encountered. Good luck, and...

RACE ON!!!

TA

I agree that this doesn't look like typical damage, but if you look at a picture with a 36 and a 44 you'll see that a 44 is much more stout, even in the webbing :yesnod:

CFI-EFI

Batwing styles and part numbers have changed over the years, but I think they are all interchangeable, within their respective axle series. A picture Joby posted a long while back, showed two axle assys, one on top of the other. It is MY recollection that the 36 batwing looked beefier than the 44. Maybe what ever allowed the batwing to twist like that had a hand in the internals turning to mush. After all, it was the visual problem that made you look into the diff, further, isn't it? There is more here than just 36 vs 44. Good luck, and...

RACE ON!!!

TA

I think you may be on to something. You're correct that I would have never even looked at the rear except for the fact that I was doing one-legged burnouts. I wonder if my problem with the clutch-pack going could have somehow caused the breakage on the cover. I guess in my mind I just assumed that the cover was strong enough to withstand this. Well, I guess either way its time for a new rear and a new cover :crazy:

Fuzzy Dice

I was about to post that a pic I saw posted CLEARLY showed the 44 to be beefier including the batwing..did you get it backwards by chance ?..I think Mr Mojo has a pic that may help if he is listening...the sad truth is, at some point, serious torque + serious hook = bye bye 36... :(


[Modified by Fuzzy Dice, 10:31 PM 10/25/2003]

marlon88

I agree that the breakage of the batwing didn`t had to do with the dana 36 strongnes !! BTW here is a pic of my dana 44




[Modified by marlon88, 6:04 AM 10/26/2003]

CFI-EFI

See your post in the Drag Racing section. I just finished addressing this question, over there.

Fuzzy Dice,
No, I didn't make a typo, which I often do. I remember in Joby's picture, he had a shot of the two rear ends, one on top of the other. At that time I knew less about these rears. Before I paid attention to the bolt patterns, I guessed that the 36 was really the 44, because of the "beef" of the batwings. I could be wrong, but I didn't mis-type...this time. Either, above or over in the Drag Racing section, I mentioned that there are several part numbers for both batwings, some may be heftier than others for a given axle model.

Is there a moderator in the house? Is it possible to get this single question posted by the same person, in two places, consolidated to one location? I'm spinning my wheels answering here and refering to there, and vice versa. My guess is that TA and others trying to follow the thread would appreciate it too. Thanks, and...

RACE ON!!!


[Modified by CFI-EFI, 12:25 AM 10/26/2003]

TA

You're right, the "trusses" do appear to be beefier on the 36, but I thought the main upper and lower bars were bigger on the 44. Sorry about the double post. I just figured I'd get the drag racers and the tech guys to chime in.

J Z06

It's hit or miss on the 36. mackey and panuzzo put HUNDREDS of runs on their d36's with ZERO issues. towards the end, john p had some troubles as to be expected when you run something to death :)

I'm glad you found your problem BEFORE the trip to e town. Nothing is worse than breaking at the track, on the way to it or on the way home.

A dana 44 will increase your peace of mind and should be quite reliable for your combination. There we're a lot of them being put to the test yesterday! Man was that track sticky :)

TA

Damn, I wish I could have been there. I was really hoping to get into the 12s yesterday and it sounds like it was a great day for it. But you're right, I'm glad I saw the damage at home and avoided a breakage at the track. BTW, congrats on your time! :cheers:

0ski_dwn_it

TA....

Sorry for your dilema...But your lucky that you caught it before heading out or along a road somewhere.

I am not going to say what it is, but I believe I have the answer to making both the D44, and D36 nearly indistructable. When I had mine apart this past week, my engineering mind was at work. I see all the weak points of the D44 and the D36 is basically the same, just scaled down...so it is just more at risk. Anyways, plans are underway for a trial setup, and is actually at a machine shop now. My thoughts are in order to hurt one of these rears after I get done to it what I think needs done, you will have to have enough power to explode the entire outter shell etc to hurt it. The cost to build one, is well up in the air yet, they gave me quotes, and will have a better price after actually doing it. But I can assure you after its tested in D44 style in my car, I am going to have it done to a D36, and I am going to put it back in my car (D36) and see if I can break it. If it holds up to that...95% of the people here will not be able to touch it.

This will be a GREAT savings to everyone here that needs to upgrade to the D44, and still a savings to the people like myself that just needed to get a D44 rebuilt. So sit tight...hopefully by the end of next week, I will have it back to me for installation in my car! CAll it project X. :D

TA

I'll be looking forward to hearing the results of your testing :cool: :cheers:

CFI-EFI

I don't blame you for looking for "double the responses", but, I'm too slow to type everything twice.

I don't see a response to my comments on:
In either place. Any thoughts?

What kind of 60's are you getting. I've been racing a Dana 36 for 6 years, now. Luckily, for the rear end, I don't have much power. It has 160,000 miles on it and the grease hasn't even been changed. It probably has 700-800 passes on it. It will be interesting to see what Ski, has up his sleeve. Good luck, and...

RACE ON!!!

scorp508

No, its not.