Drive Shaft Play

Hey all!

2013 4x4 with 120K miles

Slight chirp/squeeking noise on acceleration from a dead stop (Doesn't happen all the time)

I have some play in my drive shaft. The rubber books look fine enough

The belts seem fine

I know it's not a ton of info but what would you guys suspect??

Thanks!

 

Define play? How much and in which direction? And where, Im guessing carrier bearing?

 

This has been reported before, I think there was no recall do believe there was a "warranty enhancement"

EDIT: This covered 2005-2011 so you may be SOL. See below

 

How did you determine the "play"?

The play could be carrier bearing or U-joints or loose flange bolts or a combination of all......

 

if you don't let off the gas you won't have a problem, yeet.

 

I'd say maybe 3/8 inch up/down and left/right. The truck does have a Ironman full lift w diff drop and cb drop.

 

I just tugged around likely at the center u joint site

 

Likely carrier bearing. The carrier bearing appears to be out of alignment with the shaft.

But consider. To replace the carrier bearing, the center U-joint needs to be removed to allow access to the nut on the yoke. This is an opportune time to replace all the U-joints.

 

Careful.

Drive shaft runs from the front differential to the front wheels.

Prop shafts run from the Xfer case to the front diff and to the rear diff.

 

Gotcha! It's the center bearing area that has the play iin it.

 

Does the squeaking speed up as you accelerate to the point where you can't hear it anymore above 25mph or so? if so, ujoint is likely on it's way out

It's also possible the CB is bad too and that caused the universal to wear out prematurely. Best way to check is to pull the driveshaft off and check for play at each one

 

Replace all 3U joints and the carrier bearing
it is the perfect maintenance to do while you’re there and I don’t see any reason why it shouldn’t be done looking at the issues you are reporting

 

Agreed. Just another point to consider. Get the U-joint with the grease zerk in the cap. Easy to access. The zerk on the U-joint spider can be a bugger for access.

 

Thats not terrible. Do you have any new / worse vibrations?

That was my symptom of a bad CB was vibes at certain speeds and certain loads.

But you are chasing down a squeak. Probably the easiest thing to do first IMO is grease all u-joints until fresh grease comes out

 

So I took out the drop plate kit that came w the Ironman lift. The "play" is gone. I'll grease up the u joints this week

 

U joints are shot
Needle bearing pretty much cracked up. Luckily not in the diff. Got a $900 estimate for full replacement.

 

Wait what? 900 bucks for new u-joints is insane. Even with the front clamshell needle bearing work

 

WOW!!!!

The U-joints are about $20/ea and the Carrier Bearing is about $50. Figure an hour to drop the prop shaft, then 1 hour per bearing, 1 hour to install prop shaft. All in roughly 6 hours..

Is the quote for a NEW prop shaft??

I had a shop tell me the U-joints and CB could not be replaced. I did the work myself.

 

Sorry guys! new prop shaft (complete) and u joints. The U joint connecting points had some damage to em. I have two back to back work trips and I train out of the truck so I'm pretty stuck. At this point doing the math on waiting on parts, rental car and leave from work to do the repairs I'm better off getting new parts. I'm keeping the old stuff to see what I can do, if anything, to have a "spare".

 

In all my life......I've never needed a spare prop shaft.

Sounds like the "spare" will be garage clutter or paint it up, stick it in the yard......call it ART.