I'm in the process of remanufacturing the driveline out of my 53' chevy sedan (powerglide) after it burst a few years ago. I was backing up and put it in drive a little too quick. It literally turned into a slinky and was an absolute pain to get yanked out of the torque tube. Beings as I have no refernce points to get a length for the driveline shop (front end needs room to slide in and out of the u-joint). I measured my 54's driveline and came up to 70.5" (63" without the pinion gear parts). But beings as it was still in the differential when we measured it, I'm not too confident on our accuracy. How close of a tolerance do I need to make a working driveline for this car? How much room dose the front spline need to move? I'm procrastinating pulling the shaft out of the 54' as I'm a little nervous as to how difficult it will be to yank it out of it's races. If someone has this data written down somewhere, it'll make my day!
Never heard of that sort of situation before. This is the stock, torque tube drive line/rear end you're dealing with? It would probably be easier, and cheaper, to just replace the torque tube/third member parts as a unit I would think. There's got to be a bunch out there with so many V-8 conversions being done. Where would you even go to get a replacement "shaft" made, and would a drive line shop even have that ability these days? Maybe take this question over to the 49-54 forum on ChevyTalk.Org; there are a couple for old factory/dealer techs there that continue to amaze guys with what they know. Butch/56sedandelivery.
I don't follow what you are doing either. If just the drive shaft went, find a donor car and swap the whole center pumpkin and drive shaft as a unit. This day and age, you won't find anybody that will build the parts you need for anything at all affordable.
while any 49-54 shaft by itself can be used, if swapping the entire center torque tube section out, keep in mind the gearing. A '53 powerglide car has the 3:55 gears, so you would want to try and find a '50-54 powerglide car rearend in good working order. If you aren't afraid to tear it down, then swapping your good 3:55 gears onto your donor 49-54 assembly is possible.
Something doesn't sound right. In the 1960's my brothers and I did unspeakable things to 49-53 Chevs with the same driveline and never twisted a shaft like you mention. I also began working at our small town Chevrolet dealer and never saw this type of failure. Also, I agree with others.......find a complete unit and put the assembly in
Sorry for any confusion. How about we start with a picture? For the longest time I thought I killed my trany.... till I started pulling things apart and saw this chiller. Updating the drivetrain dosn't fit with my plans for the car and I'm trying to avoid robbing any more parts off the 54' than I have to (it's restoration is already going to be enough of a chalenge) Not trying to be difficult, I promise! In short I need the overall length of a complete welded driveline for this car. I'm working with a shop out of Austin that thinks they can fix it. Now if anyone has any leads on a replacement, I'm all ears. I missed out on one on Ebay a few months back and haven't found anything since.
I have NEVER seen anything so strange. I thought the actual drive shaft in these cars was a solid ,steel shaft. I still say ChevyTalk.Org is going to be your best bet, and I'm sure that photo will cause quite a stir; two members in particular, Raycow and Gene Schnieder, would more than likely have an answer for you. It's so uniform in appearance, and I'll bet it made for some noise. Butch/56sedandelivery.
I agree with Butch; go to Chevytalk.org. They also have a classified add section just for the '49-54's. I gave my '54 driveline away through that forum. Steve
That is pretty amazing!!!! Sorry for you dilemma.........but thanks for posting.......couldn't have imagined such a thing it if I hadn't seen it. I had a '51 Chev with Powerglide in in High School ( 1960/61 era) and abused it pretty badly, trying to fry the Powerglide so I could justify converting to stick shift....only succeeded in blowing the engine!
Holy shit... Ive never heard of one doing that before. You should be able to find the whole setup relatively easy though. Everybody is tossing the torque tubes out for open rears. Put a wanted ad here in the classifieds
Go with the '51-'54 torque tube not the '49-'50 you'll get the better (Bendix) brakes, also the drums aren't being reproduced for the '49-'50 Chevys
Looking into a few leads right now. Thanks guys! As far as the sound it made.... as soon as I put it in gear it just made a loud 'BOOM' followed by what sounded like someone rattling a bolt in a pipe under the car as it started drifting forward. Once I had it parked and started it up, It made the same rattling noise in any gear and when I would put it into park, oh how the gears would grind. Like I said, I thought I killed the tranny but in retrospect, all the simptoms make total sence now. I probably stripped something out with the parking function (I essenitally would be putting it in park while going 10 or 20mph). But then again it never could hold the car in position anyway. If I parked on a slight incline, it would creep forward and make a poping noise. I just got used to using the E-brake every time I parked. More pics too:
OK, here you go. I posted a thread over on ChevyTalk.org, and another member made a link to this thread on the HAMB. Good news for the OP, a member on Chevy Talk is offering you a driveshaft for FREE! He's in Georgia. There you go, just look in the Chevy Talk 49-54 forum if you're interested. Butch/56sedandelivery.
My dad always talked about the torque tube driveshafts doing that. He said it was a bear pulling them out of the tube after they un-coiled. He described them as being made like a "Damascus rifle barrel". I guess now I know what he meant.
I have a complete rear end and torque tube out of a 50 chevy. Maybe I'm close enough to you. Where in Texas are you?
YES! It was a major PITA! It actually took about two months. The pinion gear assembly wouldn't budge after I removed the retaining screws so I had to make a custom puller using a 3/16" wire cable figure-eighted around the gear. Once that was out I could see the inside of the pipe. Boy was that erie. The shoulder that the pinion bearings sit against was the biggest issue because the 'coil' was larger than it's ID. I would wedge long screw drivers between the tube and the coil, let it sit and relax for a few days, re-wedge the screw drivers, let it sit, and eventually the end of the coil was small enough to start fitting through the race. I got enough of it through to start grabbing it with plyers and was able to finally force it through one night. I paraded it around the house proudly!
Wow and I thought I was having trouble with a cracked carrier barring(I don't remember the actual name). In reality thanks to JJ the biggest problem I have is finding the right price. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Just an update: I've got a driveline and the car's finnaly coming together. Many thanks member Tgoss on the chevytalk website. Pictures and data to come!
This is the 'new' driveline. I have it assembled to my pinion gear set and I replaced the back bearing while it was apart (the front one still spins smooth with no slop). The only thing holding me back from getting it in the car now is getting the front torq-tube bushings replaced and rebuilding my U-joint. I had a little trouble finding a new kit for the U-joint but I got luckey with a NOS kit on ebay. Once I get one of those fancy removal tools for the bushings, I'll either go with the Oakie bushing repair, or just slide in another bronze bushing for the front one. The back bushing seems to still be snug with the shaft. There was some pitting on the front of the driveshaft, Hopefully this dosn't lead to another explosion. If it does..... at least I'll be experienced. I'm going to baby this car more than I did before, so I'm hopeful.
Just an update: The torq-tube and rear-end are all back together. After reassembly I pulled the front bushing with the fancy expansion puller tool only to find that someone in this cars past had already driven an Oakie bushing into this thing (kinda wish I had seen that one comming). This means that I can't pull it out unless I tear everything back apart and make a Loooong driver to knock it out from the back side. On the bright side, only the front bushing in it was wore and it's pulled out. So I'm going to try to cut a new one on the lathe (very thin bushing that's definanly not an off the shelf item) and drive it in. If I can get my tolerances right, I won't have to worry about my ID compressing. My other mulligan is that the NOS u-joint set I got wasn't correct. So I have three options.... drop $170 for a new kit, use my old one (usable but has a bit of play), Or make my own set. Doing that shouldn't be too hard as I'd probably make one using needle bearings instead of the steel-on-steel original. It's just the time game. In the mean time, how much play is permisable in the U-joint? Can I use my old one while I'm machining a replacement or am I asking for trouble? Swapping it out is a quick job to do once I have it.
Another update: Made a bushing to go in the front side of the drive line. It was a bit tricky as I had to bore it loose enough to compress down when driven in without clamping against the U-joint. But I got it! I reassembled it with the old U-joint for now until I can find a replacement. After some brake work, I got to test drive it around the neighborhood this evening. First time I've been able to drive it since 2007! Very awesome day! Also, The night before last I was able to get the old vacuum tube radio set up with a new dash speaker and voltage reducer. Got to listen to crummy AM radio.... which was actually kinda cool. I think I enjoyed it more than when I had an actual CD player and four speakers set up in the car. Waiting 10 minutes for the tubes to warm up made it that much more special. If you guys haven't noticed yet, I'm a sucker for old school tech. Vacuum wiper motors, iron-glide tranny's, 6 volt electrical, It's all right up my ally.
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