As some of you may know, I installed a locker in my truck yesterday.
Well today I thought I would take it off road to see how much better my truck would perform.
Since my cousin is in town form Alberta I thought I would take him to the top of a local mountain so he could catch a view of the whole coast. It was breath taking. (unfortunately I didn’t have my digi cam with me)
Anyhow the trail to the top of the mountain is pretty tame. It’s just a logging road, no technical sections.
On the way up the mountain when things started to get bumpy on the washboards my truck started to make this bad grinding noise. It sounded like a gear somewhere wasn’t meshing properly and was slipping out of place.
We were pretty close to the top by this point, and I didn't want to make the trip in vane, so I pushed on to the top, where the cliff is located at to catch the view.
When I got to the cliff I jacked up the rear end of the truck to make sure the locker was operating properly. As far as I could tell it was working just fine. I also checked the oil levels in my tranny and T-Case and they were fine.
After we enjoyed the view for a few minutes I decided that I didn’t want to continue off roading for the day just incase the rear end was acting up. When I got onto the pavement the noise seized to exist except for a second or two when the grinding would start then stop very quickly.
When I made it back home I took the truck over to a friend of mine who is a mechanic and had him drive it/look at it.
He said the locker feels like its operating properly, but he wasn't 100% certain since we couldn’t get the truck to make the noise again.
In the instructions it says that the locker uses about 25% of axel backlash to operate. When we turned the axel back and forth it was only turning about 15-20% before it stopped. Should there be more backlash?
When I set the locker up I made sure I marked everything carefully. I preloaded the bearings with the pinion side adjuster like the instructions say to do, and when it was all said and done, the ring gear backlash was exactly the same as before I pulled it apart.
When I was driving I couldn’t really differentiate where the sound was coming from. It sounded like it was coming from the tranny, and I could feel the vibrations in the shifter when it started to grind. But the tranny never had any probs before I installed the locker?
Another thing... How loud are the ratcheting couplers suppose to be?
My Lock-rite came with new side gears. I was told that the kit with the new side gears was a lot louder than the one that uses the stock gears. When I slowly pull around a corner the ratchets are pretty loud. If I’m going at a moderate speed they aren’t that loud at all. Is this normal? I know they are supposed to click. But how loud is the clicking noise suppose to be?
Any help or info would be great.
TIA