WyoSyclone
Active member
Hey Guys,
I installed my Gilbert propshaft this past Saturday and thought some of you may want to see what is involved. This isn't a complete set of pics, but it gives you the general steps involved....
In this pic I had just taken the stock shaft out and sighted down the side of the stock shift bracket to see what the clearance issue looked like.... yup, looks like it's going to interfere!
So, I installed the new shift bracket with less offset. I think this may have been one of the earlier brackets from Detroit Turbo (is that who made those brackets?) - I bought this complete set up off a fellow member here on the board.... anyway the bracket was too thin and would not tighten up on the shaft. So I clamped a washer to the bracket and used a file to cut the inside of the washer to the same cutout as the keyway in the bracket... problem solved. The visegrips make a nice way of holding the bracket so you don't put any undo pressure on the shift arm as you tighten the bolt.... DO NOT OVERTIGHTEN THIS BOLT!! You don't want to be taking your tranny pan off to replace the shift arm!
Next up was taking the factory Yoke off the front differential and replacing the seal.
....And installing the new Yoke, and torquing the nut back down to spec...
This is the new shaft safely installed in its new home... (ready for some abuse
)
One note.... you can't use the new bolts that were supplied in the kit. The heads are so large that there isn't a tool made that would fit between the bolt head and the shaft at the tranny..... So, I re-used the original bolts...worked out fine.
All in all, not a terribly difficult job. Instead of cutting re-welding the shift cable hold-down bracket at the rear, as the instructions tells you to do, I just bent the bracket a little bit. The cable is still perpendicular to the shift arm so that's OK.... had to readjust the shift linkage just a hair but I thought that was a lot easier than cutting and welding the bracket.
Now I need to get some Royal Purple and flush the front diff, and refill it.... you do lose just a bit of fluid when you take the factory seal out of the housing.
Words to the wise..... I wouldn't try this without being able to get the vehicle on a rack, or if you have a pit like I do. Make sure you buy the 32mm socket for the Yoke nut ahead of time, borrow the yoke puller and a slide hammer seal remover from NAPA... have the torque wrench handy and a tube of loctite!
I installed my Gilbert propshaft this past Saturday and thought some of you may want to see what is involved. This isn't a complete set of pics, but it gives you the general steps involved....
In this pic I had just taken the stock shaft out and sighted down the side of the stock shift bracket to see what the clearance issue looked like.... yup, looks like it's going to interfere!
So, I installed the new shift bracket with less offset. I think this may have been one of the earlier brackets from Detroit Turbo (is that who made those brackets?) - I bought this complete set up off a fellow member here on the board.... anyway the bracket was too thin and would not tighten up on the shaft. So I clamped a washer to the bracket and used a file to cut the inside of the washer to the same cutout as the keyway in the bracket... problem solved. The visegrips make a nice way of holding the bracket so you don't put any undo pressure on the shift arm as you tighten the bolt.... DO NOT OVERTIGHTEN THIS BOLT!! You don't want to be taking your tranny pan off to replace the shift arm!
Next up was taking the factory Yoke off the front differential and replacing the seal.
....And installing the new Yoke, and torquing the nut back down to spec...
This is the new shaft safely installed in its new home... (ready for some abuse
)
One note.... you can't use the new bolts that were supplied in the kit. The heads are so large that there isn't a tool made that would fit between the bolt head and the shaft at the tranny..... So, I re-used the original bolts...worked out fine.
All in all, not a terribly difficult job. Instead of cutting re-welding the shift cable hold-down bracket at the rear, as the instructions tells you to do, I just bent the bracket a little bit. The cable is still perpendicular to the shift arm so that's OK.... had to readjust the shift linkage just a hair but I thought that was a lot easier than cutting and welding the bracket.
Now I need to get some Royal Purple and flush the front diff, and refill it.... you do lose just a bit of fluid when you take the factory seal out of the housing.
Words to the wise..... I wouldn't try this without being able to get the vehicle on a rack, or if you have a pit like I do. Make sure you buy the 32mm socket for the Yoke nut ahead of time, borrow the yoke puller and a slide hammer seal remover from NAPA... have the torque wrench handy and a tube of loctite!
