Thread: Replacing Salisbury bearings

Originally Posted by goingbush

I only had a Salisbury apart to fit a Maxidrive or Truetrac, in which case you defenitly need to set up from scratch

Not when doing a Detroit, rip it out then slam it in

Originally Posted by Vern

Brian I did the same as you, except I lunched my shims getting the old carrier bearings off. So I ordered some dana60 ones from amazon, got out the micrometer, measured them all up as best as I could, stuck the carrier back in, bearing blue, and it was perfect
Just need to do my solid pinion spacer and seal and all done

Damien, I must have been a bit more gentle than you when I removed my carrier bearings/shims as I managed to reuse them (after a little straightening on the anvil). Have done about 4 Sals over the years and never had to reset pinion height yet. I wasn't happy with the backlash on 1 so I sacraficed a set of bearings and reset it. (that was before I found the dummy bearings). Very interested in the solid spacer you are doing. Are you using hollow bar to make it out of. Very interested in seeing a pic when you get it done. I have just finished rebuilding one and used the crushable spacer

Steve, I only have the dummies for the carrier as I have never had to adjust pinion height.

Brian, I accidently over tightened the drive flange hence now I'm doing the solid spacer.

Pinion depth should not alter unless changing CP or housing.Solid spacer Yes YES but make sure you dont finish up with to much preload keep the CP backlash and preload
within specs some marker paste to check tooth pattern and your right to go
Dont forget the oil

Originally Posted by goingbush

there is no easy way to get the carrier bearings off a Salisbury without damaging the shims.

if you change the pinion bearings you will need to start from scratch, the existing carrier shims will be a guide only.

I would buy a spare set of carrier cones and hone out the centres so that they are a push on fit, that way you can set up the shim pack & still be able to adjust them if you stuffed up, otherwise once you have pressed the cones on you wont be able to, once you have found the correct shims you can press on the real cones.

That's good advice regarding the set-up bearings. However there's at least one tool that does allow you to remove the carrier bearings without damaging the shims - Durasolid's bearing puller. These are designed for the Dana 60 so they're perfect for the Sal.

And if it was me, I'd probably make my first set-up attempt by using the old shims and see where the pattern is, and then work from there by either adding or subtracting as needed.

Just bumping this for a Q.

What's the consensus, is a solid spacer that much better than the OE collapsible one ?

Will be doing a Sals soon.

I put one in mine, although my vernier must be ever so slightly different to my mates who made the spacer as I had to shim it, no big deal though
Not sure if its a better way to go or not though

I put a new OE one in mine when I rebuilt it, so can't comment on the solid one. Maybe I'm a just a pussy, but they take a LOT of effort to compress when you set them up and I'd be really surprised if they actually compress in operation.

Only advantage I can see is being able to shim the solid one like Damien has done. Would definitely make it easier to set up than the "bit more, bit more, bit....crap....too much" experience with the collapsible one.

FWIW, I had very little joy with using carrier setup bearings.
Borrowed some and got everything set up nice, pressed on the real bearings and preload/backlash was miles out.
After making up a decent puller to remove the new cones without damaging them, I decided it must have been that the setup bearings I used were different brand than the new Timken bearings I was using.
Bought some genuine Timken cones with clearanced bores to use for setup, and repeated the exercise. Still no damn good!!!
Thankfully, since I'd already made the puller I was able to set it up by trial and error by removing the bearings from the carrier and adding/removing shims. Never really got to the bottom of why the setup bearings didn't work, as after a week of frigging with it every night I was just glad it was done.
Done about 9000k's on it since and its all good so pretty happy with the outcome - just a bit frustrating on the way along.

Hopefully yours goes smoothly Rick.

Steve