JTRNEWYORK

Hey guys whats going on. First time posting here on MF. so heres whats going on. i have a 2007 gt 5 speed. The person i bought the car from had installed ford racing 4.10 gears. Now when i bought it the gears always made a little noise nothing crazy. Last week my pinion seal started to leak. I followed all the instructions i could find on the forums. 1st problem i saw was when i went to take off the pinion nut it required no force to remove it at all. I put it back together the same way it went on and now i have a bad howling when I'm on de accel. when i accelerate it goes silent. should i tighten the pinion nut more? not to sure what to do. Any advice will help. Thanks

tx_zstang

ouch... You may have damaged the pinion bearings. Yes, you SHOULD have followed the preload procedures when tightening the nut, and used red loctite on the nut.
You essentially are running the pinion bearings with no preload at all, and if you used the same nut, it'll will get looser.

When remove the pinion nut, you are supposed to measure the pinion preload before removing the nut, then replace the seal and install a new nut to the previous preload. IIRC, on an existing install, the preload should be from 6-12 inch-pounds or somewhere near that range (new is from 16-28 inch pounds or something). That is using an inch-pounds dial-type torque wrench and measuring the resistance when turning the pinion with the torque wrench.
You could try getting it to the proper torque, but depending how much you've driven it, your pinion bearings are probably already damaged.

JTRNEWYORK

should i tighten the pinion nut more? I havent driven the car since. I was thinking of just buying the ford racing install kit with new seals and bearing and have it installed. Or can i just tighten the nut more? Problem is the nut was loose when i first took it off. Im lost

Simon1

I would not touch it. I would do a little research and find a shop that specializes in gears. Someone who does only gears, or it's their specialty.

The shop I go through keeps the car almost a week. He installs, drives, checks, goes through two complete heat cycles and checks again. Ends up being perfect. He also will install whatever I ask him to or bring him.

Simon1

When I researched what shop to use, I went to guys racing at my track and asked around. The guy I used was recommended by 3-4 guys that had raced for years and lived locally.