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View Full Version : Mini Spool installation in an 8.8 - Question...



JeepinHank
05-06-2005, 09:11 AM
Anybody have experience with 8.8 mini spools?

My buddy was installing my Yukon mini spool last night, and he wasn't able to get the c-clips back in. Everything else went together just fine.
cross pin wasn't a problem
put the ring gear back on the carrier
shafts are fully seated, but the c-clips are a no go. There just doesn't seem to be enough clearance.

Dave, I know you run one, and I think Gabe had one for a while. Did you guys have any issues like this?

I'm wondering if I need to grind something to get the clearance. If I do, should I grind down the blocks or the c-clips. I really need to get this figured out, and get the install finished... I was hoping to get this axle swapped in Saturday.

Any help or info would be appreciated. Thanks fellas!

Hank

nathaniel
05-06-2005, 09:14 AM
Anybody have experience with 8.8 mini spools?

My buddy was installing my Yukon mini spool last night, and he wasn't able to get the c-clips back in. Everything else went together just fine.
cross pin wasn't a problem
put the ring gear back on the carrier
shafts are fully seated, but the c-clips are a no go. There just doesn't seem to be enough clearance.

Dave, I know you run one, and I think Gabe had one for a while. Did you guys have any issues like this?

I'm wondering if I need to grind something to get the clearance. If I do, should I grind down the blocks or the c-clips. I really need to get this figured out, and get the install finished... I was hoping to get this axle swapped in Saturday.

Any help or info would be appreciated. Thanks fellas!

Hank

i'm pretty sure that dave ground down the c clips to get them to fit. As far as i know thats the only way to get it to work

BMRisko
05-06-2005, 09:55 AM
I remember Nate having to grind down his c-clips just a hair as well.

BigDaveZJ
05-06-2005, 10:07 AM
I didn't personally grind mine down, but they are ground down. I got it used from someone who threw in the modified c-clips. But yeah, definitely needs to be ground down.

JeepinHank
05-06-2005, 11:02 AM
OK, so I need to grind the c-clips.

Any guesses as to how much I need to grind and where?

Do I just need to grind the front edge of the c-clip to make a bevel (to get it started going in), or grind the whole thing to reduce the overall thickness of the entire c-clip?

Thanks so far guys!

BigDaveZJ
05-06-2005, 11:03 AM
On mine it was the top and bottom of the C that had to be ground down.

Nordic1
05-06-2005, 11:39 AM
I had the same issue with my ARB... Also had to use a thinner C-Clip

MaineZJ
05-06-2005, 01:03 PM
look at the minispool where the c-clips slide in.
You have to grind them enough so they go into that slot.

nmzj
05-06-2005, 01:06 PM
I would swear that I've go the stock (non-modified) clips in mine. Just used a punch and hammer to TAP the c-clip back in. It has been a year and a half since I took my mini-spool out so I could be remembering wrong.

Jason

JeepinHank
05-06-2005, 01:09 PM
On mine it was the top and bottom of the C that had to be ground down.

Cool deal. All clear now.
I think I misunderstood my buddy a little when we were talking about it last night.... Here's a pretty good writeup about swapping an 8.8 (with a mini spool) in an XJ:
http://www.tildesoftware.com/philip/pics/fabrication/ford8.8/

Has the same Yukon mini spool that I got, so that confirmed everything for me...

I gave my buddy the go-ahead, so the 8.8 should be finished up this evening.

Thanks again fellas.
Hank

JeepinHank
05-06-2005, 01:39 PM
I would swear that I've go the stock (non-modified) clips in mine. Just used a punch and hammer to TAP the c-clip back in. It has been a year and a half since I took my mini-spool out so I could be remembering wrong.

Jason

I got an email from Ted (PeakZJ) earlier today - another nod to his great customer service by the way....

Anyway he said there were two approaches to dealing with the c-clips.

1) Grind down the top and bottom of the clips as suggested above
or
2) Put the clips in a vice, and slightly bend them so they fit.

When you put yours in and tapped it with a punch/hammer, it probably bent the c-clip just enough to clear the mini spool. That's just a guess though.

I don't know how mine will end up going in, I told my buddy to go with which ever way he preferred. I trust his judgement.

BigDaveZJ
05-06-2005, 01:41 PM
I compared my stock C-clips to the modded ones that came with the mini spool and it looked to me like a good 1/4" was taken off the top and bottom. Little too much to just "bend" out of the way IMO. Although I have NO idea what brand the thing is.

JeepinHank
05-06-2005, 09:02 PM
I compared my stock C-clips to the modded ones that came with the mini spool and it looked to me like a good 1/4" was taken off the top and bottom. Little too much to just "bend" out of the way IMO. Although I have NO idea what brand the thing is.

Ted was talking about C-clip axles in general with that suggestion.... I think you're right, and I'm going to need to grind.

Talked to my buddy again this evening, and he doesn't want to grind without someone telling him straight. I guess I don't count, since I don't know jack about something like this. Anyway, he's giving a call in the AM to Randy's tech line to see how they say to handle it. I'm not going to complain - he wants to make sure its done right. In fact, probably more so than me - I just want to get my shit finished.

I'll post back and let you know how we get it handled...

Jim311
05-06-2005, 10:44 PM
I just welded mine in.



:finga:

ggruszynski
05-06-2005, 11:22 PM
I had thought about going the spool route with 33 spline axles, but went with an ARB as it will be a DD (sort of).

Gabe

Swamp boy
05-08-2005, 12:39 AM
My C clips are ground on the side to fit in the mini spool as well... :smt003


I am sure thats what they will tell him to do...

JeepinHank
05-08-2005, 09:19 AM
Yep, that's what they told him to do, grind the c-clips and/or modify the mini-spool as necessary. The problem is he wasn't able to just modify the c-clips since I'm running the thick ass 4.56 ring gear. You have to remove the ring gear to get the x-pin out. They ended up clearancing both the c-clips and the spool, but I have no idea exactly how they did it.

My buddy dropped the 8.8 off at the shop yesterday, but I didn't get the chance to open it up and check out exactly what they did. He had some other stuff to handle, so he didn't have time to hang out and explain the process.

Anyway - I'll tear into it in the next couple of days and take a few pics of the process.

nate
05-08-2005, 03:29 PM
Why do you need to remove the ring gear to remove the cross pin? You should just have to grind a tiny bit off one or two teeth and it will come out. I just did that last weekend with a set of 4.88s.

OverkillZJ
05-08-2005, 03:40 PM
Why do you need to remove the ring gear to remove the cross pin? You should just have to grind a tiny bit off one or two teeth and it will come out. I just did that last weekend with a set of 4.88s.

I never felt comftorable with that tooth grinding thing... Guess no ones had probs with it though.

nate
05-08-2005, 03:49 PM
The pinion doesn't run hard on that end (heel?). You just need to remove like 1/8", if that for maybe 1/4 of the tooth. What I do is use a Dremel with a fine grinder stone, pull the cross pin out, grind a bit, pull pin, grind. Keep going until it slides out. Also if you pay attention when you put the ring on the carrier, you can get it so you have to remove less, or sometimes it will come out. I have a set of 4.56s like that.

I have run this on 3 gear sets and never had any issues. It's either do that or notching the cross pin.

I don't see how a person could remove the ring gear with the carrier still in. It's going to be hitting against the pinion. Even if you were able to get it out, then you need to go buy new bolts...

JeepinHank
05-09-2005, 09:05 AM
Still haven't opened it up... I've been busting my ass on the front suspension all damn weekend.

On a brighter note, I now have a front axle, springs, shocks, steering, and control arms! 4 days to do a rear suspension, I wonder if I can do it?

ogdak
05-09-2005, 09:17 AM
Sure you can, I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Choctaw Bob
07-26-2005, 11:24 AM
I compared my stock C-clips to the modded ones that came with the mini spool and it looked to me like a good 1/4" was taken off the top and bottom. Little too much to just "bend" out of the way IMO. Although I have NO idea what brand the thing is.

Ted was talking about C-clip axles in general with that suggestion.... I think you're right, and I'm going to need to grind.

Talked to my buddy again this evening, and he doesn't want to grind without someone telling him straight. I guess I don't count, since I don't know jack about something like this. Anyway, he's giving a call in the AM to Randy's tech line to see how they say to handle it. I'm not going to complain - he wants to make sure its done right. In fact, probably more so than me - I just want to get my shit finished.

I'll post back and let you know how we get it handled...

The factory C-clips are heat treated so you should grind on them a little at a time keeping them cool so they keep the hardness they need to keep from shearing when you put a side load on them. I have ground these by painting them with machinists blue then instaling one at a time to get marks on them so I would know how far to grind them.

JeepinHank
10-03-2005, 10:31 AM
I hate to drag up this old topic, but I wanted to offer an explanation as to how we installed the mini spool in the 8.8. I finally got around to draining the fluid and replacing a bad axle shaft (bent flange) this weekend, so while I was in there, I took a couple of pics of the modified c-clips and where we ground the mini spool to accommodate the install.

First off, just to clarify, you don’t have to grind a tooth on your ring gear in order to install the cross pin / c-clips. That’s what the notched cross shaft is for. I never really thought about it, but it’s a trick little idea, and makes perfect sense after you’ve done it once. You leave the cross shaft installed when you bolt the ring gear to the carrier, then, after you install the carrier/ring gear, you rotate the notch of the cross shaft over to the side you’re installing the axle shaft on. (Note the convenient groove in the top of the cross shaft to turn it using a flat head screwdriver. The notch allows the axle shaft to go in far enough to insert the c-clips. Then you rotate the cross shaft back the other way and do the same with the other shaft. After you get the c-clips in, you rotate the cross shaft to align the retaining bolt, and bolt it up. This is probably completely evident for some of you folks, but I’ve heard so many people talking about grinding down a tooth of the ring gear, I figured I’d post it up.

Now, to install the mini spool, we had to do two things. First, you’re going to have to take some material off of the c-clips in order to get them to go in. Here’s a pic of a un-modified c-clip vs a modified c-clip.
http://www.lewis-lewis-cpas.com/Jeepin/Writeups/LA_Build/Longarm-10-01-05/DSCF0548_s.JPG
You can tell a bit of material has been removed, but I think there is still plenty to keep everything together. This is also a good time to note that the Dana 35 c-clips will work for the 8.8, so keep them for spares.

Second, you’ll have to make some room on the mini spool itself by clearancing the “side gear” blocks. I didn’t feel too comfortable doing this, but I trusted my buddies, and they went through with it. Basically, you grind a little, do a test fit, grind a little more, and so on until you get it right. It would probably be advisable to only grind a little at the time anyway, in order to prevent the spool components from getting too hot since they’re probably heat-treated during the manufacturing process. Here’s a pic of the grinding on the mini-spool piece (what I’ve been referring to as the “side gear” block). You can also see how the cross shaft is rotated to allow the axle shaft to go in for the c-clip install:
http://www.lewis-lewis-cpas.com/Jeepin/Writeups/LA_Build/Longarm-10-01-05/DSCF0550_s.JPG

Another angle that shows a decent comparison of the two sides:
http://www.lewis-lewis-cpas.com/Jeepin/Writeups/LA_Build/Longarm-10-01-05/DSCF0552_s.JPG

Other side (rotated to show the grinding here):
http://www.lewis-lewis-cpas.com/Jeepin/Writeups/LA_Build/Longarm-10-01-05/DSCF0551_s.JPG


Basically you need to take off just enough material to allow the c-clip to slide in. We did this on opposing sides (ie. front of the pass side, and back of the drivers side). I really don’t know why, but it seemed to be a good idea when we did it. This method will make pulling a shaft pretty difficult (as we found out this weekend). You might be able to cut a groove in the other side of the side gear block to allow you to get the c-clips out with a punch. We chose not to go this route. A good 90* pick would have been pretty valuable, but we were able to get the c-clip out with a piece of a coat hanger with a small hook bent in the end.

I’ve put a little over 1,000 miles on the axle / spool since it was done, and everything seems to be working fine. Hopefully someone finds this to be helpful.

Jim311
10-03-2005, 06:25 PM
Hard to believe that tiny little clip holds your wheels on! Good tech update, BTW.

nate
10-21-2005, 01:03 PM
If you don't have a notched cross pin, then you do need to grind a tooth or two of the rear gear. I run an ARB in my 8.8, and I didn't want to grind that cross pin. When I say grind the tooth, it's not very much that's removed. When I open up my diff to change the oil I'll take a pic.

nmzj
10-21-2005, 01:41 PM
I think it depends on the gear set if you need to notch the teeth. I have 4.56 gears, a normal cross pin and no teeth notched.

ELLLLLIOTTTTT
10-21-2005, 01:45 PM
I think it depends on the gear set if you need to notch the teeth. I have 4.56 gears, a normal cross pin and no teeth notched.

mine is notched.