Most likely the rough patch is the normal area of travel for the ds...and it was contaminated with water and debris.
Makes me think that just greasing a ds might not be enough...and perhaps more aggressive maintenance might be needed.
And more to the point... perhaps this is why there are boots on factory shafts.
-Mac
A sealed boot is the way to go in my opinion, my original front ds slides in and out just as smooth as aftermarket at this point.
You are also correct about a more aggressive maintenance with Adams, and here is my take on it:
Splip yoke on their ds has 2 holes, 1 for grease zerk and other acts as a breather hole through which all contamination suppose to escape. Problem is that grease will be escaping out of there as well as all the crap will be getting in. In theory it is a good design that cleans itself out, AS LONG AS there is plenty of grease in there, it will come out and push all the crap out with it.
So the question is, what is the maintenance interval? I have thought about it and came to a realization that it does not matter, because design is flawed. How can i assure that there will always be grease around the splines? Have plenty of grease in there and restrict its flow only through the top. Physics are physics, spin liquid in a sealed cylinder around its central axis and it will evenly distribute around the walls, give it room to escape and it will.
Upper portion is sealed, bottom has a hole, so we have what we have.
I was maintaining my ds but obviously not often enough, or maybe not properly enough.
What if debris already got into the tube and i put more grease in there through zerk, would it not push debris into splines?
in 2018 when i got that ds, i wrote to them to ask if that 2nd hole is intentionally left open there, because it was spewing grease during driving. They respond, i quote:
"On the end there is a plug it does have a breather hole in it for grease , water or anything else to come out of it the grease will stop coming out that sometime happens when they are first built...."
My interpretation of that broken middle school level of English is that it works as intended.
Their maintenance instruction only states to put grease in through the zerk.
https://www.adamsdriveshaftoffroad.com/maintenance-grease-information/
So that is my view on it just from lubricating standpoint. There is also a possibility of issues with balance and improperly cut splines as evident by chewed up spline ends in my previous photos, because the deeper i push spline stub into slip yoke, more resistance it encounters and consequently seizing up beyond my physical ability to separate it. Until i get a bore scope in there, this will be left to speculations.
I was pretty upset Adams didn’t find the problem and sent me down a rabbit hole. Should have gone with my gut from the start and just rebuilt the whole shaft. To their credit the service was amicable, but to their discredit they couldn’t diagnose the problem with their own shaft.
