Are 6s diffs supposed to have little play, or no play?

[The Bean]

1. When moving the drive cups in and out
2. When moving the entire differential left and right in the gearbox case

 

[HZRDOS]

1. When moving the drive cups in and out
2. When moving the entire differential left and right in the gearbox case

1. Hard to get all of the play out and still spin freely. Try to shim best you can under the pin. Some of mine have 2 shims, some have 3.

2. Never want play there. Most mine have 2 shims on the gear side bearing.

 

[slick2500]

Adding to what HZDOS said no 2 diffs will ever require the same amount of shims. My Outcast front I have like 5 shims I think I added 1 to the center and 3 in the rear, my Kraton only has 1 shim for each diff.

 

[HZRDOS]

Also, for #1 - this is why I only like to use the 2 peice aluminum diff cases. So hard to shim the plastic diff cup side and get the pin in with the extra shims.

 

[KevinC]

When moving the drive cups in and out….that’s subject.
When I build LSD diffs, binding can occur if the shims are too thick over the o-ring…..so there can be a tiny bit of slop to make the LSD work (for me anyways).

When moving the diff side to side in the gearbox…….you want that to be a non slop fit. You want that input pinion to mesh real nice with the ring gear. I had to put a 0.2 and 0.15 in a the rear of a Hot Racing gearbox as opposed to the normal 0.2 just to remove slop……it’s hit and miss.

On a side note, make sure the bearing that sits behind the input pinion is seated nice and properly, else it will push the input pinion too far forward in the gearbox, and you’ll wonder why things sound amiss. I had to pound that bearing in (with care) into a hot racing gearbox to get the input gear to mesh.

cheers,
kev

 

[parcou]

1. When moving the drive cups in and out
2. When moving the entire differential left and right in the gearbox case

Not much I can add...

^^^ said it all I do address those movements. As one vet told me here, shimming is like getting a Ph.D. Once you master it, it is easy to do. I must keep a lot of different shim sizes on hard as one user posted on sizes that took me the most time to get sizes...them various thicknesses.

It will never be perfect, and no two rigs are the same. I do address as much slop as I can in the hex, arms, and suspension of course, without creating binding.

Your attention to detail is spot on

 

[Diem Turner]

I put small strips of tape on the inner portion of the bearing stems (see image below) of the diff cover which helps a lot with the issues your describing. In some cases the diff cover doesn't snug down on the bearing properly allowing for excessive play.

 

[Hector_Fisher]

Adding to what HZDOS said no 2 diffs will ever require the same amount of shims. My Outcast front I have like 5 shims I think I added 1 to the center and 3 in the rear, my Kraton only has 1 shim for each diff.

Precisely. My MT410 came with two shims per F/R diff. The instructions said "in some rare cases you might need to use both shims". I had to use both....... Thought i was doing something wrong.