mudallday

i am putting new u joimts on my rear drive shaft because mine was horrible i will try and get pics but the new one is pretty tough to move... is that normal?

reddragon72

I just did my front axle joints, and the ones from autozone didn't fit, they were to wide so the c clips would not go in, then I tried Oreilly and they fit, but just barley and they are VERY tight and didn't want to move very well. On another forum I was told that if you have to use a c clamp and torque it down to much then they are the wrong fit... two places and they barely fit?? I'm going to order stock ones from the dealer cause the last ones lasted 240,000 miles with plenty of wheeling so why not put stock back in...

anyone know why auto stores u-joints are so tight...

mike37

did you let a bearing drop

its not that uncommon for one of the little roller bearings to fall to the bottom of the cap and that will make it tight and the joint will go bad fast

reddragon72

thought of that and pulled them back out and no pins had fallen they are just to big for the application. come to think of it if a pin did fall then they wouldn't go in at all, but it was just a REALLY tight fit...

mudallday

i just finnished mine. they fit fine... and after like a half hour they loosened up a bit. kinda weird. but holly cow what a difference when i get to my camera i will get pics up its bad haha.

caged

i always use a center punch to back off the ears a bit until it feels nice. i do this after the install once the clips are in.
but i use a u-joint press when i remove mine, that tends to squish the ears in a bit making them stiff.

Phil99

i replaced my rear u joints last weekend. try tapping the ends of each u joint back and forth a little bit each way and see if it gets a little looser. When i was doing it i sometimes pounded one too far one way and it made it very tough to turn and then tapped it back a little then it got a lot looser and easier to move