2004 Tacoma SAS
- Thread starter 8sixFabrication
- Start date
8sixFabrication
Member
8sixFabrication
Member
I decided to take the day off from work, and squeeze in a little more. It wasn't a ton of time, but good progress.
I was also able to get ahold of Marlin and get the stud problem resolved, so that's cool.
First thing was to get the knuckle wipers/tins put together and start packing the knuckles with grease. A buddy who works at our local Land Cruiser shop gave me a neat tip, to coat the felts with grease. It seemed like a good idea to keep as much moisture from trapping in them, so I coated both sides with some grease to see how it works out.
After getting that sorted, I moved onto the RCVs. It was a pretty big struggle to get the tone rings on them. I fought them for a while due to not really having anything to easily get them on before taking a lunch break and doing a little research. After a few minutes reading a thread on ih8mud, I decided to try heating them up. That worked well using a propane torch and evenly heating them to get the rings installed.
With that fight being over, I got the spindles installed and ABS sensors in. Now I just need to get the bearings/races, rotors and hub studs onto the hubs, then I can install those and it should be ready to put back in the truck for the final time!
I am going to try and sneak some work in on it in the evenings after the gym this week and hopefully have it back in the truck Friday. We shall see what life has in store though.
I was also able to get ahold of Marlin and get the stud problem resolved, so that's cool.
First thing was to get the knuckle wipers/tins put together and start packing the knuckles with grease. A buddy who works at our local Land Cruiser shop gave me a neat tip, to coat the felts with grease. It seemed like a good idea to keep as much moisture from trapping in them, so I coated both sides with some grease to see how it works out.
After getting that sorted, I moved onto the RCVs. It was a pretty big struggle to get the tone rings on them. I fought them for a while due to not really having anything to easily get them on before taking a lunch break and doing a little research. After a few minutes reading a thread on ih8mud, I decided to try heating them up. That worked well using a propane torch and evenly heating them to get the rings installed.
With that fight being over, I got the spindles installed and ABS sensors in. Now I just need to get the bearings/races, rotors and hub studs onto the hubs, then I can install those and it should be ready to put back in the truck for the final time!
I am going to try and sneak some work in on it in the evenings after the gym this week and hopefully have it back in the truck Friday. We shall see what life has in store though.
8sixFabrication
Member
Small progress report.
I had some struggles getting this thing back together, but it should do for now.
The other evening I got the bearing races pressed into the hubs, bearings packed with grease, and the hubs/rotors on.
After that was figured, I ran into a snafu with the drive flanges. The cap wouldn't fit. After getting some info from some buddies at Land Cruiser NW, I realized I needed the "long" flanges that were on the 95/96 axles. Which is fine because as my buddie pointed out, the splines inside the short flanges wear over time, causing slop. So now I have the correct ones, and they shouldn't have any slop. Those got painted and installed
Then I installed the new hub studs which is where I had my next issue.
These kits from Marlin use a split washer, which doesn't play nice with the cone washers. Factory had flat washers which makes more sense. The material in the split washer is soft and I couldn't even hit the torque spec before they were messed up. They even damaged the threads a little on the studs and dug into the cone washer. I was able to throw back on the stock washers and get them to torque, but I will probably order some stuff from the dealership because I have a couple oddball washers in there(somehow there's only 10 of the 12 I needed for flat washers?)
I am pretty disappointed in these Japanese made fasteners that Marlin has. Marlin has been great with their customer service, and I know they don't make these. I will still buy products from them, probably not these stud kits anymore though. From now on, I will buy OEM for the little extra that it costs.
With those issues resolved, I finally had a complete axle again. That delayed things, but it was a nice checkpoint.
This evening I had a little time to get the axle back under the truck. It's certainly not as far along as I hoped by now, but I sort of need to boot this project from the garage for a little bit while I work on some other stuff. I probably wont be making any progress on this for a couple weeks at best, but hopefully I can get back onto it soon. For now, it can sit halfway under the carport and let some more moss grow on the canopy
I had some struggles getting this thing back together, but it should do for now.
The other evening I got the bearing races pressed into the hubs, bearings packed with grease, and the hubs/rotors on.
After that was figured, I ran into a snafu with the drive flanges. The cap wouldn't fit. After getting some info from some buddies at Land Cruiser NW, I realized I needed the "long" flanges that were on the 95/96 axles. Which is fine because as my buddie pointed out, the splines inside the short flanges wear over time, causing slop. So now I have the correct ones, and they shouldn't have any slop. Those got painted and installed
Then I installed the new hub studs which is where I had my next issue.
These kits from Marlin use a split washer, which doesn't play nice with the cone washers. Factory had flat washers which makes more sense. The material in the split washer is soft and I couldn't even hit the torque spec before they were messed up. They even damaged the threads a little on the studs and dug into the cone washer. I was able to throw back on the stock washers and get them to torque, but I will probably order some stuff from the dealership because I have a couple oddball washers in there(somehow there's only 10 of the 12 I needed for flat washers?)
I am pretty disappointed in these Japanese made fasteners that Marlin has. Marlin has been great with their customer service, and I know they don't make these. I will still buy products from them, probably not these stud kits anymore though. From now on, I will buy OEM for the little extra that it costs.
With those issues resolved, I finally had a complete axle again. That delayed things, but it was a nice checkpoint.
This evening I had a little time to get the axle back under the truck. It's certainly not as far along as I hoped by now, but I sort of need to boot this project from the garage for a little bit while I work on some other stuff. I probably wont be making any progress on this for a couple weeks at best, but hopefully I can get back onto it soon. For now, it can sit halfway under the carport and let some more moss grow on the canopy
Jeremy P.
Adventurer
Are the Landcruiser tone rings and sensors going to give the correct signal for the tacoma? I had thought of trying to do something to add tone rings to the Landcruiser hub (I'm running locking hubs) but haven't bothered so I just have all the dashboard lights on.