Need advise on pinion yoke setup

[yjman]

Soon I am going to replace the pinon yoke on my d35. I broke a bolt off when my driveshaft blew apart. Well yesterday I drilled and used an easyout that also broke off in the yoke. How do i setup the new yoke without messing up the pinion backlash?

[jeepsonly]

Although I don't have an answer to that question, I do want to recommend that you replace your pinion yoke with one that allows you to use the ubolts with real nuts instead of those crazy little screw-bolts. You'll need a new yoke, the ubolts and a new pinion seal, all of which are pretty easy to install.

Stock Spicer Unit:
U-bolt replacement yoke: 2-4-8091X (about $50 retail)

Note: The u-bolt replacement yoke is an optional and recommended upgrade from the stock Spicer yoke. The stock yoke uses a "cap and bolt" method to secure the ujoint straps which is much weaker than the u-bolt design. The u-bolt yoke made by Spicer is a direct replacement and works with the same ujoints as the stock unit. However, you must also buy a new bearing seal since it's a slightly different size than the stock seal. This is very important. Avoiding this step will cause your differential to leak and will probably lead to sudden (expensive) failure.

Alternately you could drill out a regular rear pinion yoke like they did in this article:

http://www.jeepaholics.com/tech/ujointconv/ujointconv.htm

[yjman]

That looks like a great idea! I will give it a try. Mine did just want the article said I had a bolt break off and the drive shaft fell out. It broke the tail housing on the transfer case and put a hole in the muffler. Everything is fixed but the yoke. Thanks again!

[jeepsonly]

No problem. My ordeal was similar. 5 or so years ago I went 4 wheeling for the first time in my 88 YJ and broke the rear pinion yoke in half. Of course anytime that happens those little bolts shear right off. I was way up in the Sierra Nevadas and parts stores had slim pickings. I finally got a new yoke, bolt and strap kit, extracted the old broken bolt and proceeded to put the new one on. Almost done and....SNAP! Broke another bolt. Had to run around and find more and do it all over again. A few years ago in my 93 YJ I had something similar happen and decided to fix it for good this time.

Good luck! Make sure you get the pinion nut torqued to specs.