Best narrow track Dana 30 iteration questions

Dana 27 and Dana 30 with drum type axle assemblies use the same identical hubs.
Dana 25 hubs require a slightly smaller bearing and slightly smaller inner seal than the later hubs.
Either the early or later hub will fit onto either the early or the later spindles.
The D25 spindle is identical to the D27 spindle.
The D30 spindle has a larger knuckle index and also is machined to accept the D30 axle shaft bearing (caged needle rollers) otherwise they are identical.

 

These axle shafts are not the same. the one on the left is for a drum equipped D30 and the one on the right is disk. The one on the left, drum, uses a seal like one for wheel bearings on a wheel hub and rides on the collar. The disk one uses a bellows that is slid over the collar and rides in a flat machined recess in the back of the spindle. The drum spindle is rough where the bellows would ride and needs machining to work correctly. There is some important information earlier in this thread that i didn't understand what the implications were that pertains to this exact problem I have encountered. I put new universals in a disk axle shaft set and have drum spindles. I couldn't figure out why they wouldn't go together.

Machining a flat surface for the bellows to ride in. Don't care if i destroy these spindles because well, they are most of the way there.

 

Wish I had one of those. The lathe not the spindle. Ha ha.

 

the lathe i got about 9 months ago. it replaced my shaublin 2nd op swiss lathe. also got a bridgeport clone. I told the guy i wasn't going to buy any of it if the tooling wasn't included. got both and tooling for 1900.00 also got a pallet of grade 6 and above socket head fasteners, some mil spec with certificates of conformity for 100 bucks. The machines are 3 phase. The man who originally owned the stuff bought it at auction, got it home and couldnt figure out how to make 3 phase electricity, so it never got used by him. The shop he got it from is a whole nother story. the man died and his nephew was clearing out the stuff. he had welders and forklifts, a giant quadruple bank snap on tool chest thing, it was like a house.. so crazy. throwing away old iron like diamond rio trucks and huge boring machines.

place was so dangerous. open live breaker boxes with steel stock leaned up around it ready to fall into it. The forklift had a bad cylinder and it could hardly lift the lathe. so redneck. i fit right in. The hardest thing is moving that stuff into my basement by myself. built a gantry and took my time. no incidents, no broken tools.

the lathe is no newer than 1965 or so, its a clausing 6330 with a 13" plus or minis throw and like 48" between centers. I made a working collet closer out of a completely wore out royal closer. i can make some basic stuff. no digital readouts on anything. makes it much harder to replicate several of something, at least for my abilities.

enjoy

 

Heh, heh, heh, told ya so! Lol

 

yes you did, but i didn't understand. I do now and fully. I actually tried to put the bellows seal AND the wheel bearing type seal in there together. well that didn't work at all. Should have paid more attention when I pulled them apart.

The drum spindle was fairly crude in the machine work where the bellows seal would ride in the disk version. made it work ok. These spindles are pretty much junk. Im going to put this D30 under the front of my 2A tomorrow. I like it when its slow at work. i get paid to do this. super stoked!

 

Picked up my D30 and carried out of my basement.
This is my D25 in my 2A with the lug pushed through. Seems like this hub had slightly oversized holes and didn't like the lugs. I tack welded 3 of them and 2 had broken their welds.

I pulled the D25 and threw the D30 up on the springs. This is the GM backer plate on the drum brake knuckle with the drum brake spindle. Bolts right on.

The D25 hub goes right on the D30 drum brake spindle. Bearings are the same. No pressing out studs, no nothing, just pull it off the d25 and install it on the d30 as an assembly

To get the caliper to sit down on the backer plate I had to grind a little on the drum brake D30 knuckle and a bit on the back side of the caliper itself. Really its just a kiss with the 4.5 inch grinder.

Who would have thought that a drop pitman arm for a 90s wrangler would fit perfect on a 69 GTO steering box.


should have been done already, but I'm milking this.

 

Make sure you grind enough on the knuckle so the caliper has full travel as the brake pads wear ...

 

I will double check that. Thanks.

 

maybe these welds will hold? I think this side has an original 47 D25 hub. looks like someone threw it off a cliff.

 

bit of a cold today. its in. seems to have a lot of threads showing on the adjuster for the drag link. there is still full threads in the lock strap area. 4 turns lock to lock with the steering gear, but its not a full 2 turns one way from straight on way or the other. more like a little under 2 turns and a little over. Its not enough for me to just reset the pitman arm though. Tried that. Maybe i'll try again.

 

Seems to me you'd want the weight on the axle before you fine tune the drag link length.

 

I will do that.

 

Drove it around today. No more funny steering issues. Very predictable down the road on the pot holed streets. Imrovement over the wrangler steering tie rod and drag link mess I had fabbed to the D25. Its an overall improvement and worth every ounce of effort. I actually steered to HIT the pot holes to see if i could get it to death wobble or do something screwy. No chance. It probably needs some caster degree increase, but its ok. It will need some fine tuning and probably a rebuild on the steering gear. but all in all a great upgrade.

Thanks everyone for all the help!

now about full floating the rear and installing a locker..........

Chris

 

Glad to hear you like it. I've been very happy with the D30. You should post up those pics you PM'd me. Going from that to a driver is an accomplishment, if that is what you did.

 

When i get more of them together and take a good one of my jeep as it is now, I will. Thanks for all your support!

Chris