MCJ GPW Rebuild Project

Shilohsho · Dec 11, 2012

So once you get the engine and seats in you'll be done?

WolfGT · Dec 11, 2012

What year? And what's the deal with the posts on the bumper?

DanStew · Dec 11, 2012

Sorry 1942 GPW.

Hanks7jeeps · Jan 21, 2013

Pics of the parts Jeep delivered yesterday. Gary is going to try to be at the meeting tonight. So get your questions ready.

Hanks7jeeps · Feb 2, 2013

Hard at work

Hanks7jeeps · Feb 2, 2013

Motor is out!

Hanks7jeeps · Feb 2, 2013

Slowing down

97TJGUZZY · Feb 4, 2013

I unloaded the front axle into my garage saturday night and wiped it down a went ahead and threw a coat of primer on it. Dan, I will need to get the hub tool from you if its different than a d44 spindle nut socket. I plan to tear into it this week a little.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

I decided to move it out into the buildups section to separate the planning from the build.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

So I started the teardown of the Ford GPW front axle last Thursday. After sandblasting and some primer it was misleading how dirty it could be inside.
I started by removing the steering. Some of the nuts on the TREs were tack welded to the stud, so rather than remove the tie rods separately I removed the kingpin arms and pitman arm from the axle so that all the steering came off in one bunch… I’ll deal with it later.
In order to get to the king pin bolts on top, I had to remove the brakelines, I could literally pinch them with my bare hands and crack them. The hard lines and soft lines will all need to be replaced.

Next I started the teardown of the actual guts of the axle. Here it is, looking all innocent and clean.

I started by removing the 6 hub bolts that bolt the Aftermarket Warn Locking hub to the wheel hub.

Here you can see the back of the hub when I pulled it off.

And here is the lovely axle nut and locking hub guts. On a later model dana 44, the axle is held in place with a c-clip, but on this axle there is an actual nut, like on a unit bearing axle.

In order to loosen the nut, I installed one of the bolts back into the hub and used a socket to remove the nut.

Here is the hub with the axle shaft retaining nut removed.

After Removing the second part of the hub, I saw what I was really dealing with. Here is the backside of the lockout.

And this is the joy that I saw when I peeked into the now exposed hub.

DanStew · Feb 11, 2013

WOW that is a bit differnt than the later axles. I have never seen the nut on the axle tip. We can swap out the internals from the other axle if it is that bad.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

I removed the first nut pretty easily.

Then I removed the washer that separates the two nuts.

Then I knocked out some of the loose rust and went to remove the second nut. This is where things went south. This thing was stuck on. Really stuck on. This is where I ended Thursday night, I coated it with PB Blaster and let it soak till Friday.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

Friday Morning I soaked it again with PB and Strapped it down to the jackstands to prepare for some work.

After Cussing at it for a while, I finally got the second nut broken loose.

After removing the second nut, and checking to see that the brake shoes were not dragging on the drum, I attempted to remove the hub. Well, it didn’t take long for me to realize that something was wrong. I decided the bearing must be rusted to the spindle. I dug around in there, threw some more pb, and let it sit. When I came back, I peeked back in there and saw that there was another washer in there that was all cross threaded on the spindle. I drilled through the washer and removed it with some special wiggling.

Then the hub still wouldn’t come off. So I coated it with some more PB and let it sit for a while.
Then I beat on it for 30 minutes and finally got the hub off… The inner bearings are still in place for the time being, but the hub is off.

Here is a nice view of the brand new quality bearing and seal from the hub. The moisture in there is purely from the PB blaster that I added, I don’t know how long this thing has been empty with no grease.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

Then I removed the 6 bolts holding on the backing plates, and removed the backing plate and spindle as one, since the bearing was still stuck on the spindle.

Then I cracked the diff cover for the first time, mmmmmmmmm dead dinosaurs…but not many of them. What came out reminded me of chocolate pudding you get at ryans, mixed with coffee.

When removing the dif cover I noticed this little tidbit, I had read they stamped almost every bolt on these things.

Then I loosened the other lower kingpin nuts and removed the knuckles. As wet as this grease looks, I had to get an old piece of scrap metal to scrape it out, it was about hard as a rock.

Here is the dirty axle in all her glory before cleanup.

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

After some cleanup the Knuckle Balls came out pretty clean, one looks perfect, the other one looks like somebody beat it with a hammer like it owed them money.

busted

After some cleanup and primer, this is where I left it for now.

DanStew · Feb 11, 2013

Boy they did beat the crap out of it.

Twilliamson · Feb 11, 2013

Nice work on the documentation... A++

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013

Here is the list of what I need to get for the front axle, i sent it to Gary with a link to this thread.

Things it needs:

• Wheel bearings, races and seals
• King pin bearings and races
• Knuckle Ball Seals
• Hard brake lines (all 4 on the front axle)
• Soft Brakelines (1 on each drum and 1 from the frame to the axle for a total of 3)
• Pinion Seal
• Brake Shoes and Hardware
• Wheel Cylinders for each drum
• Roller Bearing for the Pitman arm on the axle, or a new one, as this one has a large hairline crack in it.
• 4 of the wheel studs are broken off or stripped
• One of the king pin studs on the knuckle is stripped

97TJGUZZY · Feb 11, 2013