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I have never seen an AAM do that. Thats a pretty good axle. But, it coulda been a Friday/Monday axle. Happens to anything that is produced anywhere occasionally. Because the last thing on your mind on them 2 days is what your doing between the hours of 9 to 5.
My front D60 broke at the plug weld on one side about 1 hour after I finished installing the axle. After looking at it, it looked like it had barely had any weld at all compared to all my others. When i built the replacement 44, i had them reweld the plugs. I was just surprised it had gone 25 years on the road and then broke after i spent bucks on locker, powdercoat, shafts, etc, in an hour.
FYI,
Welding the tubes to the centersection can be done IF! it's ductile iron. If it's gray cast iron it can not be done. Gray cast iron is not weldable. It's like powder when it's drilled or machined.
What you're describing is pot metal. It just blows away when you try to weld it but there isn't a center section under the sun made of that. Its just not strong enough.
If the center section is cast steel like a ford 8.8 is it can be properly welded with some preheat and regular wire. If its cast iron the proper way to do it is to preheat, weld with nickel rod or wire, and post heat to slow down cooling. That is the proper acceptable way. Lots of guys will preheat and weld a two root passes on the opposing materials to try to normalize the affected area when the roots are bridged together. I've done it both ways myself. The second works but its still not right.