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Black List call [message #261561]

Thu, 11 September 2014 06:03

Ken Burton

Messages: 10030
Registered: January 2004
Location: Hebron, Indiana

Karma: 10

Senior Member

This was 5 days ago but I received a telephone call last Saturday. A fellow from Ohio was passing through and stopped to visit a friend of his about 20 miles south of me. Up on backing up to leave his friends house, he lost the last of the six bolts holding the axle / half shaft or what ever you call it to the driver's side final drive flange. I have gone out in the past on two other of these Black List calls and it is ALWAYS the driver's side that looses the bolts.

T for the next call, I ordered a package of 25 of those bolts and a box of 100 washers. That was several years ago. I told the fellow, "NO PROBLEM". I have what you need. Well the answer is I have what he needed "somewhere". But after looking for over a hour I could not find them. These people always break down on late Saturday or Sundays when I can not go the local fastener place and buy what they need. I told him if he waited until Tuesday I could have 25 more of them delivered to my house or where he was located. He wanted to get going before then. So I called Blaine to get the bolt sizes and he was not home. I then called Nick at Applied and asked what size are those bolts. Then Blaine called back and verified the sizes Nick gave me.

So I started out on my hunt. 4 stores and 35 miles later I finally found enough "substitute" bolts and some blue thread locker to get him going again. That thread locker was expensive. $7.00 a small tube. I drove another then 30 miles and delivered the stuff. It was dark by then so he and his friend decided to wait until morning to replace the missing bolts. That evening when I got home there was a note to call Jim K. I called and Jim K. said "To get him going, just take three bolts out of the right side, install them in the left, and torque them all correctly." "Then fix it properly in a day or two" when you can get the proper bolts delivered by mail."

DUH !!!! Why didn't I think of that?

Then next day in the evening the fellow with the GMC called. He had installed the substitute bolts, also found the passenger side not torqued properly. He was already down the road 150 miles staying overnight at a State Park in Illinois.

On Monday I ordered 50 more of those bolts, and 100 more washers. I got them Tuesday. The GMCer who broke down wants 12 which I'll give him at the GMCMI rally. I'll take 12 for the next time someone calls my house and 12 more will go in my coach. The remaining 12 I'll throw on Blaine's table for sale at the GMCMI rally. Someday I'll find the original missing package of 25 and I'll sell them at some future rally.

As has been said many times here before, If anyone has touched, or worked on, your final drive, or CV joints, or removed those half shafts, I would go check the torque on them today. If only takes a few minutes. If any are loose I would remove them, blue thread lock them and re-torque them correctly. If they are tight then leave them alone. If the axel gets loose and flops around it can damage other stuff. Blaine had one guy he went to help that snapped the axle in half. Try finding that part locally.

I'm thinking I ought to put together a kit of this stuff and mail them out. I'm thinking about a kit of 6 or 12 new bolts, washers, a tube of blue thread locker, and a 7/16 twelve 12 point throw away 3/8 drive socket. $25.00 for 6 or $35 for a kit 12. (plus postage).

BTW,
Jim K. (Applied GMC) stocks the original GM manufactured bolts and washers and will mail them out to you if necessary.

Ken Burton - N9KB
76 Palm Beach
Hebron, Indiana

[Updated on: Thu, 11 September 2014 06:07]