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89 Suburban - The Canyonero: Rear Suspension Time!

Budget friendly build for General off-roading with an emphasis on camping and self reliability featuring a host of self-built, DIY mods.
I have 16x7 wheels with 315s and a 1/4" spacer up front. Not sure my back spacing. They sit just right on the front fenders. My 14bff is 3" narrower overall than my front so I would love some 2" spacers out back to get the look like you want. As long as I don't get into the fender lip when I stuff them.
 
I used a router with a flush bit on my H2s. Took about 5 minutes to do all 4.
 
So I started the swap. I should have noticed earlier but I didn't. I bought that aam axle partly because it said it was an open diff. It does not. It has a gov loc. I was hoping to switch my powertrax no-slip in, but I obviously can't.

I need help with the following choices:
1. Swap the ring gears so I run my old carrier with the aam ring gear. It seems this will be best.

2. Swap pinions. So I have my old pinion and entire carrier assembly in the new axle. I heard there were some alterations somewhere in the pinion although I think it's on the pinion shaft itself...and I'll have to paint the pinion. :grin:

3. Run the g80.

Which option is best? How likely would it be that I'll need to adjust the ring and pinion? It SEEMS option 1 should land me with lateral adjustments at most. :dunno:. I've never had to adjust an r&p.
 
Ring and pinions are matched and setup very specifically to each other. In a demo derby or some tuff truck rig I have mixed em but never in anything normal.
 
Yeah, I figured. This is my daily so no matter what, I'll be using the matched set from the new axle or my old one...I'm just not sure which one yet
 
I would do #1

Don't know why I had a hard time comprehending exactly what you were saying but I misread some.

Swap your carrier into the AAM axle with the AAM gears. Only resetting needed is backlash.

I'd run a pattern just to make sure. But I've never done a carrier swap like that and had a problem.
 
Took a break from the axle to rebuild the hydroboost unit I picked up at the jy awhile back. The rebuild was mostly easy with a few annoying bits. There are lots of good write-ups out there, so I'll spare you the details. Let me know if you want more info!

Mostly all torn down. I bought the full rebuild kit from piratejack.net. They have good prices and fast free shipping. I also bought my new proportioning valve from them.


The power piston had a small scratch. It's small and hardly detectable with a fingernail, so I ran over it with a scuff pad to reduce the probability of it causing an issue. Time will tell.


The nut securing the booster to the mounting plate is supposed to be torqued to 110 ft lbs. my dumbass should have torqued it on before putting the two halves together. I didn't even think I could until I thought about it after painting it. Instead I used thread locker, my front axle nut socket, and a cheap strap wrench to do what I could. It's pretty tight. I might open it up again later...Note the threaded rod coming out. I did this since the rod doesn't match my pedal. I threaded the other end and have a coupler nut to adjust it.


Here is before and after paint.

 
Interesting, never saw anyone rebuild one of those. Prob better quality doing it yourself rather that some crappy reman center.
 
I'm interested in seeing how it works when you have it installed.
I rebuilt mine and it locked up on me so I had to go get a reman.
 
I'm interested in seeing how it works when you have it installed.
I rebuilt mine and it locked up on me so I had to go get a reman.

I read quite a few write-ups. Most mistakes were something unfortunately falling out and never getting put back in, or slipping out of place upon assembly. I tried to be as careful as possible and I read and followed the directions step by step.
I'm curious to hear exactly what it did. What kit did you use?

Interesting, never saw anyone rebuild one of those. Prob better quality doing it yourself rather that some crappy reman center.

I hope so! The kit is about $41 and easy to put together, save a bastard retaining ring and the o-rings on the input rod were tough without the special tool. I followed a few tricks from the web and it all worked out. I'd do it again for sure.
 
I'll have to look through my thread to find the kit. I remember having a he'll of a time finding one and the instructions weren't great. Once I got it apart it seemed simple enough, so I was surprised it didn't work. I may have tried again if I'd have had better instructions,but since I didn't know what went wrong I said "f it" and bought a reman.
 
So I put the aam ring gear on the old carrier. In hindsight I should have used the matching bolts from the aam but the old bolts went on fine with thread locker and new lockwashers.

In another post, to get more traffic, I posted about the backlash and preload of the carrier. I'll put it here for record. At first I didn't tighten the carrier side adjusters enough so I went in and cranked them down as much as I could with two screwdrivers and established a backlash around 0.007.

I tried to pull a pattern with my old gear compound but it didn't work so well. One picture I think caught a good angle and I still would appreciate an opinion. Blazinzuk recommended Prussian Blue, and I might try it if it's at the parts store, but I think this pattern looks good. You?

 
Here is the ez inch I had machined at an angle to counter the crooked spring perch. It came out pretty good. I'm glad I work with a guy that could sneak it in and help me out.


I got the axle mostly mounted. Stopped part way so the wifey and I could hang out. I got pissed since the leaf spring bolt head that came with my ez inch didn't fit in the perch that I also got from diy4x. You can tell by the way I raise and lower the axle so many times in the time lapse. I widened the hole a little with a drill, but it was getting too tapered. I ended up putting the bolt in my drill and taking it to a file until it fit.


 
Still sucks that the perch wasn't flat, but at least you got it figured out. :waytogo:

Time lapse was cool!
 
Did booster and mc on mine... kinda sucked - wasn't easy getting down in there. seemed like every wrench I had was just the wrong shape.
 
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