i got a fancy new prop shaft in February- spicer u joints, all nice and balanced. I have had a vibration and speed dependent clicking that has gotten really bad over the past week. I was under the truck evaluating things and noticed some play in the rear of the prop shaft.

i put up a video on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/K6J6mBGll4E

I can't quite figure out if this is u joint play or normal double joint play. Anyone want to share their wisdom?

thanks in advance!
-RJ

 

Looks pretty upsetting to me!

 

That is the double cardan joint. The bearing is shut. Can cause vibration and clunking sound or similar to broken gear sound.

 

May I ask the big question at hand....where did you get the driveshaft and what brand and have you greased it regularly?

 

i got it from Dynamic Driveline out of Alabama. I was pretty impressed out of the box- looked burly as heck and was very smooth running.

i greased it when I put it in, but honestly haven't touched it sense. I was going to hit it when I did oil changes, and I'm still about 800 miles away yet. The front joint is rock solid, it's just the rear. I'm not sure what I could have done.....

I called them this afternoon about the warranty, and they were great. I probably won't take advantage of it and will just source ujoints locally and do them myself. I can't spare the truck for the time it would take to send this to them and get it back.

-rj

 

you mean Arkansas? If it's the one I'm thinking of, they have an eBay store and build heavy duty d2 shafts but they are in Arkansas

 

Not looking good. Figure it out before this ends up as the result....

 

UPDATE! First, I think that I may an idiot and entirely at fault.

I took out my prop shaft today, and the u joints are all solid, but my centering ball is toast.

I had looked up my propshaft order when I started this ordeal, and I remember the description of '5 grease fittings'. I looked the shaft over and only found 4, but found something on the centering ball that is apparently a grease fitting that I completely overlooked.

How do you grease those things? Im obviously going to replace it, but once I do....

In the end, Dynamic Driveline (yes, or Arkansas. All those deep south states look the same ) makes great, heavy duty propshafts and stand by their work. Their clients sometimes make dumb mistakes.

-rj

 

You need a needle fitting on your grease gun