I'm working up a write up on the fun that was had in Moab before, during and after Blazer Bash. But the cliff note version is my son and I might have bitten off more than we could chew. Steelbender was the hardest trail we've attempted. We hurt the Crawlabago. I'll get into the how that happened in my trip report, but the results stacked up pretty heavy.
Cracked 241 rear housing (lost all fluid)
taco'd steering tie rod
failed Warn premium hub
D44 spindle damaged from loose hub nuts (lots-o-flakes in the grease)
Core support bolts loosened up and spit out a body bushing
Dented the Warn bumper on "the Fall"
blown hose from ARB compressor to the OBA tank
I've been collecting parts since we got back. So first up is the D44 spindle. I pulled a fresh used unit from a Suburban in the pull-n-pay. Picked up new bearings and hub seal from the parts store. My son has expressed an interest to be more active in the build and repair process. He's always liked going along, but the hands-on side before didn't do anything for him. He's now seen the importance of knowing what's what when stuff goes wrong. We planned on getting some stuff done this weekend.
I let him handle the tools and gave him directions on what to do. He did pretty well. Though he struggled getting the inner hub nut loose. Strangely, there was no smoking gun to say what was the starting point to the failure. The bearing races and where the bearings ride on the spindle showed no signs of heat/discoloring and were all smooth with no damage from the grit in the grease. The little stud on the inner hub nut was pretty low and the edges rounded over. I need to look closer to the failed lockout to see if there are any signs. When I opened it up on the trail the outer hub nut had backed off so much it was grinding on the backside of the lockout assembly.
You can see how much the nut was ground against the lockout by the chamfer cut into the nut.
The used replacement with a normal-looking outer nut.
The kid getting to work.
Tearing it down.
I killed almost two cans of brake clean trying to get the slurry of grease and metal chunks/flakes out of the inside of the hub. There was a ton. I took the races out and found zero damage to the surface of the races. With the old spindle cleaned of grease, the bearing surfaces were again free of surface damage. It tells me at least the bearings were in adjustment at least for the ride out and a couple of the pre-BB trails run. Whatever the source, the spindle is still not going back on because
@Bent77 and
@fastazz81 were dead on correct when I tried to take it apart on the trail. The inner nut was fighting me when I tried to back it off and they wisely told me to stop and tighten it back up. If I took it off on the trail and it wouldn't go back on we would have had a three-wheeled wonder on the trail that would have required a lot of help to get out of there. The nut will not thread back on right now. Good call boys.
I installed the outer race to the clean hub and went on to do the inner. Turns out the old guy at Napa that struggled to look up the bearings guessed wrong. So I needed another one and we were running out of daylight so we called it a day.
I've got a D60 lined up to replace the D44 we are currently working on. I'm not going to stuff the 60 in right away as it looks like its never been apart and hasn't been on the road since 2012 based on the only registration in the glove box. The guy who has it, bought the truck at auction in Pueblo. It was setup with a snowplow and dump bed, which one is pretty useless in Pueblo. He did say he hooked up his car to it and pulled it with the truck back to Denver. He said the truck didn't have any odd handling or signs of death wobble. But he admitted other than moving it around the yard he hasn't driven it on the road much. Which is why I think it's smart to give the 60 a once over prior to installation. It has the right ratio (4.10) that I need, but it is lacking any traction device. So I'd like to save up a little and put a selectable locker in it before we put it in.
