Grease zert fitting on front drive shaft

[fpchief]

This little fitting on the front drive shaft spins freely. I have a new one but was wondering if this is a common deal to go bad? I assume i have to take off the whole shaft and separate the pieces. Is there anything i need to know other that what the time will have in it? Is the groove it fits over on the drive shaft possibly bad and that is why it came loose?

 

[NormB]

Having just replaced mine, I THINK the purpose of the zerk fitting is to allow some grease into the splines so you can eventually separate them for replacement/repair. That end cap piece is integral with the shaft and has a seal on it. Don't recall exactly how much I spent for it, under $100, IIRC. Ask Greg (86HumV) about one.

Norm

 

[fpchief]

Having just replaced mine, I THINK the purpose of the zerk fitting is to allow some grease into the splines so you can eventually separate them for replacement/repair. That end cap piece is integral with the shaft and has a seal on it. Don't recall exactly how much I spent for it, under $100, IIRC. Ask Greg (86HumV) about one.

Norm

That fitting i am referring to is called a dust cap. I do have one and i got it from Kascar. i have it taken loose from front differential and have the center bearing loose also. I can't get it to release from the splines. Trying to keep from pulling entire driveshaft if possible. Do i just need to keep working it or am i missing something? The TM says to remove entire shaft but i am trying to see why that is really necessary unless it is really that hard to separate from slip yoke.

 

[NormB]

I sit corrected regarding the "dust cap". Mine was firmly attached to the shaft.

It did take some effort to separate the two shafts.

Tried with my son, no luck. Few taps with a rubber mallet, then plastic dead-blow. Nothing.

Since I was going to replace the u-joints anyway (about $15 each and they were really worn out), I put one end of the (removed) shafts in a bench vise, spaced so I could put the end of a small crowbar into one end leveraged against the end of the bench and I whacked the top of the lever with a 2" dead blow hammer and the shafts separated a few mm at a time until they were loose enough I could just pull 'em apart.

looked kind of like this:

|<-hammer
|------------------------shaft--------------[]
| <- edge <- bench top -> ^ VISE

In case this needs to be done in future I slathered assembly lube on the components liberally then hit the zerk fitting with a few shots of lube after assembly.

I heartily recommend pulling the entire set, cleaning things up, checking the FRONT u-joint, then putting everything back together. It may be possible to remove JUST the rear shaft, I didn't do it.

Did you read the manual?

NB