58-62 Rear Axle

[Terry D.]

Can anyone shed some light into how straight a rear axle has to be? In others words is there a specific tolerance they need to be within? I have two sets of axles and when a machinist friend put them up in a lathe we got two different readings for being straight. Are they suppose to be dead on or is there a small amount of wiggle room? I'm no machinist but my guess would be they have to be within 3-5 thousand.
Any and all help greatly appreciated
Terry

[Bill M.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

I would want to know the runout of the axle flange and translate that to the tolerance on wheel lateral runout.

[Terry D.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

Bill
I have the run out at the axle flange on two different axles, checking the runout on the wheel will have to wait till I get it back together as there wasn't much left of the bearing, so the wheel was not running real straight at the time. FYI, I talked to a company in the south who advertises "restored" early Chevy axles. I asked the owner how they checked them for straightness, he referred me to a gentlemen that he pays two hours a day to do that. I talked to that person and after 10 minutes of hemhawing around he finally admitted they do nothing but clean them up, paint them and put new studs in them. I'm just trying to avoid this problem from happening again and so far I haven't made much progress, we were on our way back from Bowling Green Ky. to Akron Ohio and the bearing let go 20 miles north of Columbus on Sunday evening around 6, $405 to get her flatbedded home. This is the second bearing in about 8 thousand miles.

[Ken A.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

Sounds like you got a bent/warped housing, which is very common due to the fact it may have been welded on in the past. A bent housing
will eat up bearings pretty quick. You need a pro like Currie or a old timer with a BIG lathe to straighten a housing. They do it cold with a press & a BFH. Once set up they're good for a zillion miles, no more flatbeds. I'd also send the axles or, better yet, have them do the whole rear end.

[Bill M.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

You can translate the runout at the flange to runout at the wheel by using the ratio of wheel radius to radius of where you measured on the flange.

I agree that you need an axle pro to look at the whole axle for the bearing failures.

[Mike E.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

Depending on the bearing you used, it's possible to install it backwards (never any instruction in the box) and have the seal inward, which prevents lubricant to the bearing. Not an uncommon occurrence.

[Terry D.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

I found a place here in Ohio the does nothing but rear ends, am taking whole thing, housing, axles and pumpkin down Monday. He sees this a lot and says housing can be straightened. Mike all the bearings you get now are sealed and not lubricated from the housing.

[Terry D.]

Re: 58-62 Rear Axle

Mike, my bad, just got a new National bearing and it is open on one side!