12 bolt truck axle vs van axles

[bigbadchev84]

I think I toasted my 12 bolt on my way into work today. I changed the pinion seal in it this weekend and about halfway to work it started making a tick tick tick noise. When I pulled into work it was puking gear oil out the pinion seal.

I have a buddy with a 12 bolt out of a 76-78 chevy van, but it has 5 bolt axles. Im not in a situation to pull the shafts out of each one and measure right now. So does anyone know if the van and truck axles are the same length?

The reason I ask is because the 14bolt ff are different.

 

[sweetk30]

vans are wider.

and let me guess you railed the pinion nut on till it stoped didnt you ?

if so you over tourqed the nut and crushed the crush sleave and blew the bearings out.

 

[bigbadchev84]

vans are wider.

and let me guess you railed the pinion nut on till it stoped didnt you ?

if so you over tourqed the nut and crushed the crush sleave and blew the bearings out.

Thats the thing, I read up on the process, marked the nut on the pinion counted the threads and the turns to remove it, reverse for install? Im not sure what happened?