Tried three rental places round here and none had 3/4" drive impact. Finally threw in the towel and me and the dog took a ride to Harbor Freight and came home with a 3/4" Earthquake Impact Wrench. Twin hammer, 300 to 1100 ft.lb. maximum torque is 1400 ft. lbs.
one pull of the trigger and the nut was in the bottom of the socket. One more problem solved, now I've got the wrench for the next one.
The compressed gasket, mic's out at about .015", I have some 1/32 material but I don't think it will compress that much and that would allow the brg. to slip forward to far. I'll stop by auto parts in the morning and see if I can find something around .020". The preload on the pinion bearing looks like it is set by the torque on the nut. The shims in front and back of the bearing races sets the pinion depth, that shouldn’t change.
The flange has a nice little grove worn in it from the old seal, I'm gonna clean it up a little on the lathe with some cloth but I would suspect that I will still have some seep because of the worn spot. Wish I could find a new felt packing for the flange.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL
