Technical Tech Week - Halibrand/Winters Quickchange

Thought you rear end guys might like this for tech week.

I recently had a customer that wanted a Quickchange with early Ford axle trumpets. He already had a Halibrand 11 bolt Champ center section with a 31spline iron locker. Halibrand made side plates that would accommodate the Ford trumpets. They are no longer available new and the used ones are getting VERY pricey. Also, in order to use the locker with side plates instead of bells, it would have to be narrowed.

Winters Performance offers a version of their Sprint QC that has side plate adaptors for the trumpets. The plates are available separately (Part # SR2493). Both sides are the same.

Since the Halibrand center is 4 3/8” wide and the Winters is 3 ¾” it seemed logical that the narrowing would be minimal using the Winters plates on the Halibrand center.

So, I received the customer’s parts and ordered the Winters plates.


Here is what I got.




Years ago, this locker was referred to as the ‘new style’. Actually, I believe that there were at least 4 types of Lockers for the Quick Change. This would be the second generation.


The Winters side plates are drilled for 7/16” bolts. The Halibrand rears use 3/8” studs. Fortunately, someone had already changed this center to 7/16” studs and thru-bolts.



Uh, oh!

 

First challenge: Winters uses large bearings in these plates like a live axle. The bearings for the differential use a much smaller race.



Two ways to solve this: One, make a spacer to put the smaller race in the side plate. Or two, make a sleeve for the differential to adapt larger bearings to the race in the plates.

Since we already had the bearings that fit the differential, and the large bearings are quite a bit more expensive it was decided to make the spacers to adapt the small races into the side plates.
A little time on the lathe with a boring bar made these.

 

Sweet

 

They are a shrink fit into the plates (about .003”). The inner diameter is a .003” shrink for the bearing race.






I installed the races into the spacers with anti-seize, then installed that assembly into the side plates. This is done by heating the plates in an oven to about 300 degrees. Dropping the assembly into the plate and letting it cool. The races were put in the spacer using the same method.


Now, with a set-up bearing on the differential, we check the fit of the side plate to the center section. BIG gap here. At the same time, it was discovered that the differential sat in the right plate too far and the ring & pinion were way too close together. (like negative 3/16”!) So, put 3/16” worth of shims behind the right side bearing and check the left side gap again.

 

Got to cut at least this much in order to make it fit.




At the time I didn’t have access to lathe tooling to hold this differential properly to cut the fins. So like a real hot rodder, I improvised. This is the left side of the differential set up in a brake lathe. (Pays to know people)

 

The lathe tooling didn’t like the interrupted cut on the ribs too much. So, it was a little slow going.


Eventually, it looked like this.

 

Finally like this!


Putting a radius in the corner

 

All in all, the left side bearing surface was cut over an inch. The side plates, bearing spacers and right side bearing shim forced the carrier toward the left side. An additional .080”was cut to allow for shimming the carrier for preload. The diameter for the bearing surface is 2.000”.


Using set-up bearings, (real bearings honed to be a slip fit on the differential) the preload and backlash was set.

 

Special tool and a lb/in torque wrench.

A couple of details:

 

Halibrand side plates had two tapped holes in the outer ring between the side plate attachment bolts. Turning a couple of set-screws in these holes forces the plate away from the center section, much better than separating them with a chisel or screwdriver. I decided that the Winters pieces needed that upgrade.


Rather than stacking up a pile of shims to space the ring gear away from the pinion, a shim was made by drilling a 3/6” aluminum plate with a 3” and 2” hole saw.

 

Two notches were cut on opposite sides of the carrier. These allow a 2 jaw puller to get behind the carrier bearings to remove them without damage.



This is the completed center ready for the trumpets. Since I was pressed to finish this rear end for a deadline, I didn’t get any good pictures of the trumpet modifications and assembly.

 

Trumpets set up for a look-see.

These are some highlights of building up a Quickchange center section using Winters side plates. If you need any other details please feel free to ask. Hopefully, someday there will be a book containing this and other builds with many variations.

Bruce

 

NICE HOW-TO POST!! Congrats on the "Outside -the-box" problem solving, especially on the 'alternative machine tooling' (& machine work) as not everyone is able to visualize like that!! It sets a good example for the rest of us!!

 

Creative machining to say the least.
I was a machinist for 30 years in one shop, had mostly old wore out machines, never had to get that resourceful though. I did have to use a spin balancer at the local tire shop one time when they f $#@&up one of my brand new Halibrands. Took over an hour to file, sand, and polish out a big groove in the outside face of it.
I guess the moron never heard of those plastic protectors for their install tool.
You might say that I was not a happy camper that day.

 

I have also used a brake lathe to put a brushed finish on some aluminum wheels. Could polish them like that, too.

 

Thanks for this thread, lots of cool tips here.

 

Nice work ,very informative and innovative.

Geoff aka whodaky

 

Thank you gentlemen.

 

great thread with neat detail and effective solutions, love it. Thanks.

Cheers,
Drewfus

 

Here are a couple of pics of a True Track cut down for a use in a narrow center. The sleeve is pressed on the carrier and machined for the large live axle bearing. I may be building one like this shortly. If so, I will add that one to this thread.


.

You can see how much easier it is to cut this carrier. They are quieter, to.

 

Just for reference, this is a 'Gold Track' similar to the one in post #20 above. It is uncut. There are Gold Tracks, Diamond Tracks, Winters Tracks, Platinum Tracks and True Tracks (maybe others). They all look like this. You can see that modifying this would be easier than the Locker shown earlier in the thread.

 

I used a DPI unit and had it machined down to fit the Halibrand side plates. I think he charged me $100. The carrier is still plenty strong and has been driven hard. I am going to try your method with the Winters side plates as soon as I locate a 11 - bolt 301 in good shape.

 

I want to try it the other way, with spacer sleeves on the differential and use the BIG bearings. You still have to narrow the differential but there would be less finicky machine work. I have a customer that might go this way. If so, I'll post the procedure to this thread.

 

Bruce.....thanks for showing how it's done.....great work there !

 

Thank you. It's kind of specialized, but not rocketship science.

 

Lynn,
Something else you might want to consider; the new ring gears are threaded which in turn eliminates the bolt threads from interfering with the plates. yours look like they might be close. I'm assuming they did not touch, as I believe you have run this rear for a long time. Just sayin'

Bruce

 

They were very close but did not hit and the rear is doing just fine after thousands of miles. A little noisy but ear plugs work well. Ha!

 

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/vote-now-tech-week-october-2015.995188/

Short time to vote

 

Great information
So I have this halibrand v8 quickchange center section and it's NOS . I haven't seen one like this and is like a 201 but not sure . It fits V-8 bells and would love to know more about it and we're to get parts.

 

Looks like a later (Kansas) center and side bells. All parts for a 201 will fit. You might want to mic the pinion bore. It could be sized for ball bearings or tapered roller. PM me and I'll give you some specs to check.