Rear pinion angle after lift....

O

opie74

New member
Has anyone addressed this issue after a lift and if so, how?

I had a new shaft built and Id hate to have it get torn up due to the pinion angle being off after 3" of lift. I am getting some vibs from what feels like the driveline and my pinion is pointed down from being perpendicular to the shaft. More than the suggested 1-2 degrees, too.

So far the only option I am seeing are the lower arms from ToyTec.
 
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MStudt-

Its definitely rear end. I've checked wheel bearings, u-joints, and felt for play in the t-case and pinion bearings with no issues that I could see. Swapped driveline fluids and greased fittings. Changed tranny fluid since they all needed it anyways and saw no metal shavings or anything to raise any flags.

Next thing on my list is to get under the truck this week and do some measurements, but I won't be able to hit that until Thursday at the earliest and if not then it won't be for another week.

anything else you think it might be? Balance on the tires feels right but I had someone suggest getting an alignment at the stealership as "they do them differently" which I had never heard before.

I had some thoughts it might be engine related as the slight vibration happens with my foot barely on the gas and only over 30 mph. acceleration and deceleration feel fine and no noise.
 
Schady44 said:
MStudt-

Its definitely rear end. I've checked wheel bearings, u-joints, and felt for play in the t-case and pinion bearings with no issues that I could see. Swapped driveline fluids and greased fittings. Changed tranny fluid since they all needed it anyways and saw no metal shavings or anything to raise any flags.

Next thing on my list is to get under the truck this week and do some measurements, but I won't be able to hit that until Thursday at the earliest and if not then it won't be for another week.

anything else you think it might be? Balance on the tires feels right but I had someone suggest getting an alignment at the stealership as "they do them differently" which I had never heard before.

I had some thoughts it might be engine related as the slight vibration happens with my foot barely on the gas and only over 30 mph. acceleration and deceleration feel fine and no noise.
Click to expand...

If it's a driveline vibration the rear end is going to shimmy around some. The reason I'm asking is because after lifting a vehicle it can bring out other issues. Many people think driveline vibrations when it is not. I my opinion, I don't think you should be feeling anything with a 2" lift. Have you or any else changed the u-joints on the drive shaft itself? In some situations when changing the u-joint you could need to have the shaft balanced. They basically weld a weight at a given spot on the shaft to balance it. Ball joints can also give you vibrations. It really depends on where you're feeling the vibrations at; at the wheel, in your seat?

In my experience, if it is driveline related you'll feel it at lower speeds. You shouldn't feel it when slowing down, and it should go away or lesson as your speed increases.
 
Good to know.

I'm not sure if the previous owner did any u-joint repairs, but I have been the only other owner for the past 5 years and haven't had to.

I'm feeling the vibrations at the seat and my feet, but they are more noticeable audibly. At highway speeds the I've noticed a slight shake above 70 but don't know if it gets worse as I tend to hover around 73-75.

maybe take the driveshaft off and check the u-joints that way? and go have the shaft re-balanced? I think I'm still going to check the drive line angles anyways just so I can log everything into my memory bank.
 
diggity-

I'll give that a check too. basically just trying to get more systematic with this before I go dumping money on things I don't need..... yet.
 
Schady44 said:
Good to know.

I'm not sure if the previous owner did any u-joint repairs, but I have been the only other owner for the past 5 years and haven't had to.

I'm feeling the vibrations at the seat and my feet, but they are more noticeable audibly. At highway speeds the I've noticed a slight shake above 70 but don't know if it gets worse as I tend to hover around 73-75.

maybe take the driveshaft off and check the u-joints that way? and go have the shaft re-balanced? I think I'm still going to check the drive line angles anyways just so I can log everything into my memory bank.
Click to expand...
I had really similar symptoms in my truck but at a lower mph. It was my rear U-joint. Do you have a light rotational chirping noise at very slow speeds in reverse?
 
Blackcat

haven't noticed any chirping that I can think of. I think by the sounds of things I'm going to take off the drive shaft next chance I can get and give everything a good inspection and check the pinion and transfer case angles while I have it off and def give a good check of all bushings.

I'll keep you guys posted if/when I find anything. thanks for all the help!
 
alrighty guys,

haven't managed to make it to home depot or anywhere today to get a angle-finder to measure pinion and transfer case angles, but I hopped under today as I was having some new fun today. yay!

truck seems like its working a little harder than usual to accelerate and keep going and vibrations were happening as I was accelerating anywhere above 35 ish.

crawled under and started checking out the driveshafts. no play at the diff's or transfer case which is promising, but got some play in the front slip yoke when putting pressure up and down... may 1/16th of an inch tops either way which doesn't seem good but I could be wrong as drivelines are not my specialty. the rear had no play in any u-joints or at the diff or transfer case but I could absolutely not twist it clockwise or counterclockwise at all. As I don't do this ever I had thought there would be some rotational play, or since it's in park and probably not completely level am I just trying to work against gravity here?

also the noise associated with the vibrations pulsates and sounds more in frequency with the drives shaft rather than the wheel.

I'm thinking of bringing it to a driveline guy, but if it sounds like something simple I can most likely handle it.

thoughts?
 
Pinion Angle really doesn't matter on the rear axle. The 4runner is equipped with a double cardan joint so the change in pinion angle, especially on a couple of degrees, will be adjusted by the joint itself.


Now the Those who have dropped the front diff with a diff drop will have changed the front pinion angle. There is no double cardan joint on the front drive shaft so vibration can result. Nobody drives at highway speed in 4x4 on pavement to actually feel vibration.
 
http://www.toyota-4runner.org/4th-gen-t4rs/125257-slip-yoke-caused-my-vibration.html

found this thread this morning, and thought it was worth a shot to see if I overfilled the slip yoke when I was servicing everything. Went for a quick ride around the block and compressed the suspension as much as I could since I didn't want to drive too far with the zerks out. Got some grease out as I was hoping and now I have to head out so I will update later to let everyone know if it was really that simple.

and I re-greased the front slip yoke and the play subsided (not-overfilled). not sure if that could have been causing vibration also, but all the grease points seem to be in order now.
 
Singtoe said:
Pinion Angle really doesn't matter on the rear axle. The 4runner is equipped with a double cardan joint so the change in pinion angle, especially on a couple of degrees, will be adjusted by the joint itself.


Now the Those who have dropped the front diff with a diff drop will have changed the front pinion angle. There is no double cardan joint on the front drive shaft so vibration can result. Nobody drives at highway speed in 4x4 on pavement to actually feel vibration.
Click to expand...

Pinion angle does matter, even with a double cardan shaft. Granted, you're not going to have as much of an issue, but you could still none the less. A 1/16" of play is nothing that I would worry about. Every 4x4 vehicle I've ever owned has had around 1/16" of play, and was considered to norm in the jeep world. Now if it's more than that, I'd be worried about it.


 
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MStudt said:
Pinion angle does matter, even with a double cardan shaft. Granted, you're not going to have as much of an issue, but you could still none the less. A 1/16" of play is nothing that I would worry about. Every 4x4 vehicle I've ever owned has had around 1/16" of play, and was considered to norm in the jeep world. Now if it's more than that, I'd be worried about it.


Click to expand...

My pinion angle never looked like this from the factory. Even with no springs and the axle articulated to the nubbers does the drive line have this straight shot to it. Or no pinon angle.
 
Singtoe said:
My pinion angle never looked like this from the factory. Even with no springs and the axle articulated to the nubbers does the drive line have this straight shot to it. Or no pinon angle.
Click to expand...

Never said it should have looked like that from the factory. Nor would I expect something to come from the factory 100% correct either when it comes to suspension. No matter what the suspension there is always room for improvement. Due the the OP's 3" lift, it's going to mess with the already not set-up correctly shaft, putting it more out of whack. After running jeeps for a long time I'm learned how important it is to make sure it's correct. With the short base, you have even less to work with.
 
update

Alrighty guys,

been a whirlwind of a few weeks and thought I should update everyone. Thanks for all the input and info.

after the slip yoke greasing I noticed a change but was still getting vibrations on the highway and that weird harmonic sound (not sure if I entirely explained that or mentioned it) that sounded like it was coming from the driveline. Anyways.. driving to work two days ago the engine power just went... engine still ran but extremely rough idle and blinking CEL so I shut her off and just towed her to the dealership since I pretty much knew I was getting a misfire. Got a lot of things going on and just didn't have the time to fiddle with my daily driver right now.

The Toyota Master tech that looked over my truck was extremely thorough and efficient. I have dreaded going to mechanics and dealerships for years because I really love working on my own vehicles and just can't stand anyone else doing it... I'm going to be horrible when I have children (jk). anyways.. he ran electrical checks on everything, compression test, vacuum test and eliminated everything I had though to look besides a fuel injector. Sure enough he got to the fuel injector and was getting signal and return on #1 but no change when he disconnected the plug. when disconnecting #2 the engine cut out. This is where the story gets better. Instead of just replacing an injector he asked if he could disassemble the rest of the intake manifold since he was going to anyways because of the misfires on #1 and #4. I know its hard to get to#4 and he would probably have to do that anyways and since the top half was going to be off its only a few bolts for the rest to the head. So it turns out that extra 20 minutes or so of labor payed off because it turns out the fuel injector was indeed fine, but there was excessive carbon build-up on the intake valves. He cleaned everything up the best he could, re-assembled and she runs much better. harmonic sound is gone, no hesitation, and I notice no vibrations. And while I was there I had them re-balance the tires while I was at it.

So it appears that my vibrations were engine related, but I will keep a close eye and ear on the driveline just in case. And now I'm off to get some quality fuel system treatment like techron or redline, and I will probably do a couple rounds of that to get what he couldn't.

And I should mention that mechanic was extremely informative and came out and had a good long talk with me about everything and I am extremely grateful he didn't just start throwing parts at it and kept my bill down as much he could.

I've owned the truck for 5 years ( 99' base 3rz 4x4 automatic) and it only had one previous owner who was an old man that babied the shit out of it. I got it in 2009 with only 70k on the odometer. I guess my point is that I haven't been putting a lot of highway miles on it and can only assume he didn't either so maybe this carbon build-up is stemming from a lot of stop and go driving?

So I hope this helps anyone that may have similar issues. Give her a good cleaning every now and then. These motors are pretty awesome though because it was just plugging through that crap until it had enough, and even then she still wanted to run.
 
Singtoe said:
Pinion Angle really doesn't matter on the rear axle. The 4runner is equipped with a double cardan joint so the change in pinion angle, especially on a couple of degrees, will be adjusted by the joint itself.





Now the Those who have dropped the front diff with a diff drop will have changed the front pinion angle. There is no double cardan joint on the front drive shaft so vibration can result. Nobody drives at highway speed in 4x4 on pavement to actually feel vibration.
Click to expand...


What he said !
 
I did not do a diff drop on the front since it was only a 2 inch lift. I did check the boots after install to see if one might be needed, but everything seemed pretty good and I haven't had any problems with it.

And I did noticed the double cardan after I got back under there so did not go any further. I do have a big move to Tennessee coming up in May and am thinking of taking the shaft off and making sure the u-joints are ricky tick and slip yokes are in good order before the trip though. but for now I have a bunch of things on the to-do list for the move hence sucking it up and taking it to the dealership.

Thanks again for all your help! If it wasn't the solution I definitely just learned more about my truck and I enjoy that.
 
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