home brew front drive shaft..pics inside

[Hogback Fabrication]

Mine is 2.5" .250" wall square tubing and 2.0" .250" square tubing (the 2" fits very nicely inside the 2.5" tubing).

You need to grind a groove in the smaller tubing to allow clearance of the weld seam on the inside of the bigger tubing.


Other than that, I bought two 1410 "weld yokes" (the part that's welded onto each end of the shaft, it holds the joints). I don't remember what size I got, there are a bunch though. Obviously you want to get weld yokes that will work with the tube you are using.

*Make sure this will work for you*

IMO its easiest to get the square tube to slide inside of the weld yoke and weld it up like that (this is how I did the pinion side of my shaft). For 2" square a 3" weld yoke would probably work. For 2.5" square tube a 3.5" or 3.625" weld yoke would probably work.

You always want a tight fit between the tube and weld yoke. Its much better to get a weld yoke that is too small and grind the tube down a little to make it fit than to have any loose fitment. The reason that you may have to grind the square tube is that weld yokes are meant to be have tubing fit on their outside diameter and you can't fit a square tube over the round hole (and they don't really make weld yokes that small anyway).

Here is a picture of how round tubing attaches to a weld yoke and how I attached my square tube to a round weld yoke:

Here is an example of what a weld yoke looks like, you can see the outside and inside diameters that I am talking about in the third picture (the one with the tape measure

If you want to get weld yokes off of a used shaft you just need to grind out the welds and pop the yoke off.


I believe that shaft (including joints) cost about $70 and I bought all of the parts brand new. Pretty cheap for a 1410 shaft that you will never dent or bend with all the slip you could ever need

 

[twoslo4five0]

yep i can add to that when you grind the grove be pacient because your gonna have to test fit the 2 pieces a bunch of times.you might also have to gring some (be careful) off the corners...

also on my shaft we used a well reducer for 3 to 2 inch (i think) cut it in half and used the smaller end on the yoke end and the larger on the other end

 

[GsxrMike]

Where can I get weld yokes? I would like to get them somewhere local so I can test fit the tubing<is this spelled right? I have the shafts that came with the axles and tcase that I am running. Could I cut those off and use them w/o any problems? What are the chances I will be able to drive down the occasional highway w/o damaging vibrations?

 

[Hogback Fabrication]

Where can I get weld yokes?

I got mine from a local driveline place, High Angle Driveline and tons of places on google will sell them to you.

I would like to get them somewhere local so I can test fit the tubing<is this spelled right? I have the shafts that came with the axles and tcase that I am running. Could I cut those off and use them w/o any problems?

Probably. The diameter of your current driveshaft will determine how easy it will be to attach tubing to it.

You're simply attaching steel to steel, there's always some way to do it.

I bought new stuff because its hard to find 1410 shafts to cut up and a used shaft would probably cost at least as much as the yokes.

What are the chances I will be able to drive down the occasional highway w/o damaging vibrations?

If you have selectable hubs you won't have any vibrations when the hubs are unlocked because the front driveline isn't spinning.

I have drive flanges (full time hubs) and they spin the front driveline all the time no matter what. I've had the square shaft up to 55 mph and haven't noticed any real vibration.

It is possible to have a balanced square shaft, its just very unlikely that you will be able to make one by grinding/fitting/welding it without machine work.


One cool idea that I was going to try is to use a liquid (I was thinking ATF) in the shaft to internally balance it (it works like equal or bb's in the tires). You would have to put some ATF in the smaller piece of tube and then weld a cap over it to keep it in there. I was going to drill holes at the end of the bigger tube so that air could easily escape when the shaft compresses.

mrk5 made a round shaft himself and used mercury to internally balance it and supposedly has good results.

 

[GsxrMike]

I was going to do if for my rear shaft as well? Bad idea? The ATF idea sounds like it would be worth trying if I made one. Where the heck can you buy mercery these days?

 

[muddermilitia]

I was going to do if for my rear shaft as well? Bad idea?

I'm wondering about this as well. $800 for front and rear High angle driveline shafts, or about $200 for square tube d-shafts. Thats a big difference. I wouldn't be driving it on the street too much, definitly not on the highway, and i do have drive flanges, but I could always pull out the slugs.