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Chipped Ring Gear Tooth - (Pic included) - run it? grind it?

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Big6ft6

1/2 ton status
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Location
Madison, WI
All,

I found this chipped ring gear tooth on my 14 bolt SF rear axle. Thoughts? Opinions? leave it, grind it?....experience-based opinions (I had one like that...etc) get extra thanks!! ;) But all opinion appreciated.

412171700.jpg
 
I have a set of used gears with the same issue. I'm going to polish it out good and run it.
 
Thanks Guys, Big Ray...how do you go about "polishing" it? I'd love a quick little tutorial, it does seem to make sense to get rid of sharp edges.

John...I'd love to know how these chips happen too. When I did a google search on chipped ring gears a lot of the images that result have chips in this area....??
 
Oh, just hit it with die grinder with about an 80 grit sanding disc. I work in an aircraft repair facility, so these are "heavy" tooling for us. When I worked the line, we kept a drill motor in one hand and a grinder in the other.


sanding disc (3") and mandrel
25pc80GRT3inRollLockMANDREL.jpg



die grinder

super tool to have in your box. It comes with a collet for 1/4" in tools (shaft size), but 1/8" is also available. You can sand, polish with scotchbrite pad disc, or even grind with a carbide burr like the ones used to port heads.
Oh, I left out using it with a cutoff wheel. And about a million other things.
Chicago-Pneumatic-CP875-1-4-Inch-90.jpg
 
Thanks Big Ray!! I don't have a big compressor, but I have a dremmel with similar attachments, which should suffice no??
 
Should work long as sand paper is some what course, just might take more time to do.
 
I had a chipped tooth in my Vette for who knows how long??? The piece wasn't in the diff when I took it apart and I beat on it regularly.
I'd say as others have, smooth the edges out, so there is no stress riser, and go with it.


HPIM1475.jpg
 
I recall a Chevette we had for a delivery vehicle at one of the auto parts stores having a noisy rear wheel bearing for years--finally got bad enough for our boss to decide to get it fixed,after he used the car once..

I told him that my co-worker and I can surely replace a simple wheel bearing,right in the parking lot..we had a slide hammer puller,and a machine shop to press on the new bearing--why send it to one of our garage customers,who'd want a few hundred deducted from their outstanding bill ,in exchange for fixing it.?..

The boss was cheap and was glad to let us try fixing it for "free"..

When we went to do the bearing,once the rear diff cover was off,we saw at least 3 ring gear teeth stuck to a magnet in the bottom of the case...oh-oh...not just "chipped" like in these pictures,I'm talking broken off at the base of the gear...:eek:..

We decided to play dumb,and just went ahead and put the bearing in it,and said nothing to the boss...figured he'd blame us somehow,either think we beat on the car every time we used it --(oh no,we'd NEVER do that ! :whistle:)...or we broke the teeth off while working on it..we just removed all the shrapnel,and fuzz stuck to the magnet,and put it together..it spun freely,with no clunking or binding up..

Much to our surprise,when we went for a test drive,the bearing noise was gone--and we couldn't tell there was any other damage in the rear end...I dont know what ratio the diff was,but it must have had more than two pinion teeth in mesh at once for it not to make any noises..
We drove that car many thousands of miles after with no failures,though we fully expected one--we used a light foot on it after that point..:crazy:..
 
That is an awesome story diesel! :haha: I baby my vehicles (seems to happen after putting blood sweat & tears in to working on 'em yourself) so hopefully this rear end will last too!
 
It's a good strong rear end. I have one in the 2x 3/4 ton 'burb. I am also looking for one locally over the 14BFF simply because of the ground clearance.
 
I am not sure if I would even touch it. Even 200 grit is gonna leave scratches in the base metal.

I have seen gears much worse go for a long time. It's nowhere near the contact pattern. Basically it's fine
 
Big6ft6 said:
All,

I found this chipped ring gear tooth on my 14 bolt SF rear axle. Thoughts? Opinions? leave it, grind it?....experience-based opinions (I had one like that...etc) get extra thanks!! ;) But all opinion appreciated.

412171700.jpg
Click to expand...
If you look at the face of the teeth you will see them starting to deface. Looking at the hardened area (dark gray around the light gray in the chip) I can see a dark spot on the back (coast) side. Might have defaced there and broke of on a coast. My experience with this is that it (defacing) will continue to get worse and eventually fail.
Gears.jpg
 
My experience with gears is in the marine industry. I do know that once the gears start to deface it will usually travel fast (in my industry). We do however put quite a bit more load on drive gears than automotive. If you decide to go with it I would (in my opinion) drive as a normal daily driver and check it again in 3-6 months (depending on your driving habits). Compare the areas circled in the photo. If it is worse I would replace them, if not just keep checking them. I know the gears in the 92 I drive went and made a real mess in the housing attributed to the hardened surface flaking off from wear and load. It is a lot harder to move 6000+ pounds than a 3000+ pound corvette. You will also notice his is not defacing that I can see.
 
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