1952-59 Ford Questions on reassembling a rear

I pulled the rear apart on my 53 and cleaned it up and painted it. All the guts look brand new so I'm just going to run this rear for this season and then think about finding one over the summer to swap in next winter.

My questions are:

1.) Do I grease the wheel bearings or is the gear lube alone sufficient?

2.) Do I put the pinion seal in dry or should I put a little gear lube or grease on it? Also, is there a trick to installing it or just get a block of wood and be careful?

3.) Should there be paper gaskets on the ends of the axle tubes and on the front side of the backing plate?

I know all of these questions are probably answered in my manual but it's at my engine builder's shop and he's not there on the weekends.

 

I would grease the bearings as the lube takes some time to circulate,soak the seal for several hours in ATF it will help it seal better as sometimes these seals may have been on the shelf for some time and may have dried out.I checked my shop manual and there are gaskets in both locations,it also says to grease the outside of the bearing and the inner race lightly befre install and torque the retainer bolts to 30-35 ft.lbs.

 

Jeff...you're the best. I actually went to the engine builder's and bugged his dad to get my manual but I couldn't find anything about the gaskets. In the manual (from what I could gather) it said to use a thin layer of permatex on the inside where the pinion seal goes. Do you think this or the ATF? I got the seals from Mac's and they look pretty damn new. I don't think I need to worry about making it swell back up.

 

If they seem soft and pliable just add the permatex and you should be good to go.The info about the gaskets is on page 153,upper left in my 52-54 Shop Manual last part of axle shaft replacement.

 

Thanks Jeff. I found it with your help. I guess I read for information as well as my students do.

I put the differential back in the housing, put the pinion bearing and seal back in and cleaned up the wheel bearings and axles. When I was looking at the manual, I think it said to torque the differential to 30-35 lbs. That didn't seem like it was that much pressure for those bolts. Was I looking at the torque specs for the axle flanges and thought I was reading the specs for the differential bolts?