Im building a 48 caddy w/454/th400 from a truck that had a 2 piece drive shaft . Question is : the rear yoke is secured with a bolt in the center. I really don't want to build a two piece shaft. can I remove the bolt in yoke and replace it with a slip yoke to allow for diff movement?? Anybody done this ?? thx flop Experience is a lousy teacher...gives you the test first and the lesson latter !!
Yes you can replace it with a slip style. But the length inside the seal/ tails haft is a critical measurement. I just did it on a 85' Dually. Posted from the TJJ App for iPhone & iPad
Might want to look a little closer at that. What would even be better would be to match the bolt in yoke to a slip in yoke. Once you do that you will see major differences, bolt in is much shorter, the splines inside the yoke are way different in length, the air hole in the slip yoke will not be in the other either. The bolt in yoke style out put shaft has an O ring that seals to the non-splined area on the end of the yoke. The fully splined slip yoke will only slip in until it rams into the O ring which doesn't provide a seal. They do make a yoke that will work for the tune of around a hundred bucks, it can be purchased at Inland Empire Driveline http://www.iedls.com Don't ask me how I know all this...lol
Been there, done that. It's a non-issue. Yes, there were all kinds of different yokes. They even make an "special" yoke, not that you really need it, to do this swap. Butch/56sedandelivery.
Got mine from Denny's driveshafts. The yoke needs to engage the proper depth or you will screw up rear seal.
The only thing I thought was hard was trying to figure out how much of yoke to leave hanging out. The splined part is way shorter, then it needs to seal on the O'ring, that's the only thing that I still wonder about. The reason I wonder is because when I hit the gas pedal something bottoms out. The only thing I can think of is the yoke hitting the tailshaft on the trans.
You are right about too much yoke hanging out. The splines at the front of the yoke need to be machined out to allow the yoke to slide further on to the tail shaft to stabilize it. This what the tech guys at Denny's explained to me. Mine has been on since 2004 and I have no issues.
Look under there and let me know how much is sticking out of the trans ? I'd like to compare to what I have.
Since you are going to have to have a driveshaft made, anyway, leave the yoke alone, and have a shaft made with slip-splines in the shaft. Cheaper and easier than swapping stuff, and buying special parts. Bonus, somebody else gets to do most of the work.
Those setups have been used on trucks for 50 + years and don't have issues and that would probably be the simple way to go. No one is going to see it anyhow unless they are way too snoopy. And then as he said, you only have the work/cost of getting the driveshaft the correct length.
you can use the bolt on yoke. find a flat type freeze plug to seal up the yoke where the bolt went thru, this way you no longer need the "o" ring inside the tailshaft. measure very carefully for the driveshaft, you don't want any more hanging out than necessary, cause there ain't much to play with.
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