how to shorten an axel

wayneb said:

A welded axle can be very strong, the axle pieces should be ground almost to a point and then fill in the "V" with many passes. I have shortened several sets and have never had one break.

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Agreed. I have done many also for street rods. Also I center-punched distance markers on axle and housing to get almost exact spacing, critical for the bearings.

I also used to weld up the odd set of spider gears to spool the axle for off-road use, never had one of those break either, but time consuming fitting pieces of plate inside the carrier...

A friend of mine uses his truck for some mud pit runs, the Dana 44 front differential kept breaking the axle spider gears. Before the next event I preheated a front carrier and welded the side gears to the carrier thinking that this would eliminate the week link. During the next run both front axles broke at the "U" joints. The solution was to swap the front diff. to a Dana 60.

I have welded the spider gears solid in several GM Rear axels. We use them in both Street Stock and Pro Stock dirt cars. Packed wet rags around the bearings then let the sparks fly. When done blow out the slag and let cool. Wash out with a couple cans of carb cleaner, blow out. Your done. Have never broken one yet.

If you cut and reweld the axel shafts,they hold up well. A friend that drag races showed me a neat trick. This is for any axel that takes alot of torque. Paint a white line down the length of the shaft. If the shaft twists, so does the line.
John

blazin said:

Thanks for the V- cut/grind idea. Basic welding technique that is sometimes forgotten. Don't forget the angle iron to clamp your work down into, to keep it square.

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Angle iron good for the start to get things centered... But....
After the first tack the angle iron should be removed and a striate edge should be used the check the axle every 45 deg. The first weld will pull the axle, so after the first tack get it striate again and tack on opposite side... Rotate 45 deg and tack again and striate edge again and weld on 90 deg.

nuffer460 said:

I have welded the spider gears solid in several GM Rear axels. We use them in both Street Stock and Pro Stock dirt cars. Packed wet rags around the bearings then let the sparks fly. When done blow out the slag and let cool. Wash out with a couple cans of carb cleaner, blow out. Your done. Have never broken one yet.
If you cut and reweld the axel shafts,they hold up well. A friend that drag races showed me a neat trick. This is for any axel that takes alot of torque. Paint a white line down the length of the shaft. If the shaft twists, so does the line.
John

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Thats what I was wondering, nothing had been mentioned of cleaning. Metal fillings are preaty agresive.

another way to do this is to cut the axel to desired length then put a sleeve or slightly bigger pipe over the axel so you would be putting the axel ends in the pipe then weld around the outside of the pipe you can also use this method to lengthen axels very strong and helps keep the lineup straight..

I'd like to know where you could get splines milled for 'a coupla bucks'. In our shop, I'd guess you'd be looking a coupla hundred bucks. On one Ford I worked on, the area without splines was smaller than the splined area, so you wouldn't have been able to cut new splines anyway. I've shortened shafts the same way, but I drilled a precision hole in each half of the axle, and pressed a dowel pin into it for alignment. For a low horsepower, low RPM application, no need to get that fancy.

I'd use the "weld the two shortened axle peices together,with a pipe or tube welded over the 'splice" on a low HP low budget home brewed tractor myself..
I used to have friends at machine shops,unfortunately I outlived them...
Wish I knew someone who'd hog out some rims center holes for me cheaply,I'm not looking forward to using (or buying) a bi-metal hole saw and doing it with a hand drill!..(I dont know WHY tractors use the same 4-1/2" bolt pattern with 5 lugs as some cars,but have 3-1/8" hub centers instead of car sized ones..probably to keep idiots like me from bolting car rims on them,right??.. !)