The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Driveline Spring perch on my 1951 3100 - converting to open drive

Gents,

I’m curious and have a question.

I have a ‘51 closed driveline that I am prepping to make an open driveline next week. What I am curious about, the original perch on the axle that pivots, is there anyway to weld it so it doesn’t pivot since I am not centering the axle on the leaf spring? Would there be any benefit to using a welded original perch instead of changing it and welding the new one on ( I have a new one sitting here already).

The reason I am curious is that I like the stance of my truck and I think that if I change the rear perch, it will raise the back end of my truck 1-1.5” and I don’t want the nose down that far/rear up that high. I’m just curious as I can buy blocks to offset the stance if that is the smarter option.

Anyone tried this or would it be dangerous?

Chris

The issue with welding the original pivoting axle mounts is burning up the rubber in them. Besides the rubber around the sleeves there are essentially rubber washers between the bracket on the axle and the pivot mount. It could be done but might be just as easy to fabricate new mounts.

I was curious about all that, just didn’t know if others have tried, how well or if it worked, etc.

Here's a closeup pic of the axle pivot mount. This is one that I recast the rubber in using a product that was too soft. You can see that you'd have to fab something to weld to the body of the pivot and to the bracket that's welded to the axle. Then weld that piece to both of the other pieces. Meanwhile, the rubber in the pivot mount is melting. An option would be to remove the pivot mounts, melt the rubber out of them, then make some steel washers to replace the rubber on each end and weld all that together, while keeping the bolt sleeve centered in the pivot mount.

Instead of trying to make the pivot point rigid, why not fabricate a pair of radius rods from the top of the axle housing to the frame, using heim joints and steel tubing? there's a kit on Ebay for just that purpose, using right and left hand thread heim joints so the pinion angle can be adjusted.

www.ebay.com/itm/147147074184?

Jerry

It's difficult to see the actual distance or height of your pivot point in your picture. I believe you could modify a spring perch to sit flush with your axel housing without to much work. By removing material from the perch mount and fitting it snug on your axel housing you could establish your ride height prior to any welding. The key is to address your driveshaft angle before any welding is completed, this will eliminate your need to add shims later. Remember when welding not to allow current to flow through any bearings, attach your ground as close to the perch mount as possible.