Companion flange and front yoke

[idiocrates]

Just a comment on a couple of parts which I purchased from Kaiser Willys in S.C. And let me preface this by saying that neither part was a throw away......in other words.....they were made to fit. First......the companion flange that goes on the rear output shaft of the transfer case. I like the fact that it came with the felt washer preinstalled and preoiled. What I didn't like was the machining on the splines where it mates up to the output shaft. After working with the flange for an hour or so it was obvious that there was just enough mill tailings left alongside several of the splines in the flange to prevent it from sliding on. I couldn't see these "burrs" with the naked eye....at least not my naked eyes......but after tapping on the flange with a brass hammer I could see where the old shaft was "curling" away the burr. I got out my trusty triangular file....ran it up and down the sides where the burrs were showing up...and waaa-laaa......the flange went on in good tight fashion. The other part.....the front-facing 4 wheel drive flange had the same problem only to a lesser degree.....and since readiness is 90% of the battle....this problem was easily overcome. Where I spent my time with this part was on the preinstalled cup that carries the felt seal just in front of the oil seal. Basically, this flange had only a narrow cup pressed onto the shaft which mates up really well if you use Kaiser Willys seals but since I had gotten my seals from Novak there was no rubber lip to fit into this cup. Also the Kaiser Willys flange did not have the larger dust and mud deflector which keeps stuff from getting packed into the front facing seal opening. And worse yet there was no way to install the large felt seal Novak had supplied. So I did a little experimenting and discovered that the seal cups could be removed from both flanges.....and since the overall length and diameter of the flanges were the same....I figured I could just press the larger cup onto the new flange, install the felt seal and away we'd go. Good theory......if you don't own a micrometer. Seems the raised shoulder on the Kaiser Willys flange is just that much larger in diameter then the old one......just enough so there was no way I could pressed on the old seal cup. I filed a little on the seal cup with a round file......and cut a bit of a bevel on the edge where it meets the flange shoulder and pounded and filed and pounded tested and pounded and filed some more and was about to give up when I figured it was march or die.....and got out the dremel tool. I bought this thing about three years ago and had never taken it out of the box so I wasn't real sure how it was going to work. I only have a small assortment of tips but one of them was a 1/2" diameter fine grit grinding stone. I attached this to the motor and proceeded to grind away at the inside lip of the seal cup. The Dremel is a breeze to operate and in no time I had a really nice looking surface on the inside of the cup. I ground on the openning until I could just start the cup on the shoulder by hand and then used a pvc coupling (for 1 1/4" pipe I think) and hammered the seal cup home. I then placed the felt washer in the cups groove, slipped the flange onto the output shaft and nutted it down tight. Dust and mud cover is in-place and all is right with my transfer case.

Jim