A great video on drive shaft angles by Shawn Wood

Texas-TJ

Texas-TJ

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I stumbled across this video on YouTube. Shawn Wood (Tom Wood's Custom Drive Shafts) does an excellent job on explaining drive shaft angles. I learned a lot.

My question is, when you increase your pinion angle, the fill hole is now lower, which means your fluid amount will be less. What is the best way to make sure you have the proper amount of fluid in the differential?

 
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Texas-TJ said:
My question is, when you increase your pinion angle, the fill hole is now lower, which means your fluid amount will be less. What is the best way to make sure you have the proper amount of fluid in the differential?
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Park on a downward slant and jack up the rear until it's around 6 degrees like stock. Chocks on front wheels.
 
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There's a great video on YouTube that shows how that small amount of gear lube capacity difference between the two pinion shaft angles makes no significant difference. The ring gear sits in the gear lube and it picks it up and throws/slings so much gear lube around and forward toward the pinion bearings that you wouldn't worry about it in the least once seen. The video uses a clear diff cover so it can be easily seen.
 
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Another alternative is to simply measure the amount of lubricant going in. For the Dana 44, this is simply 2 quarts. So literally just squeeze two bottles in and you're good to go.
 
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@Texas-TJ If you are worried about the amount of diff oil, and as Jerry pointed out above, not really an issue, but if you are you can have the rear axle on jack stands and have someone turn the wheels while you fill with additional fluid. This keeps the fluid in motion and being flung, effectively lowering the resting level and allowing you to get more in the fill hole without flowing out the plug. Compliments to @Irun for this idea.
 
Jerry Bransford said:
There's a great video on YouTube that shows how that small amount of gear lube capacity difference between the two pinion shaft angles makes no significant difference. The ring gear sits in the gear lube and it picks it up and throws/slings so much gear lube around and forward toward the pinion bearings that you wouldn't worry about it in the least once seen. The video uses a clear diff cover so it can be easily seen.
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Link? Haven’t seen a clear diff cover video related to anything about lower capacities from tilting the pinion….only videos I ever saw like that were demonstrating what changing the shape of the cover does to the fluid flow.
 
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Texas-TJ said:
So, 6 is the magic number?
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6 is the stock number if I remember right. Obviously it’s not a huge difference a degree or two off. But for a significant lift with the pinion pointed significantly up, it definitely lessens the fluid quantity a decent amount.
 
Fill it until the gear oil leak out and then add the rest through the breather fitting. May take awhile if the gear oil is cold.
 
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machoheadgames said:
Link? Haven’t seen a clear diff cover video related to anything about lower capacities from tilting the pinion….only videos I ever saw like that were demonstrating what changing the shape of the cover does to the fluid flow.
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After you watch this video you'll see why the tilt doesn't really matter.
 
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Jerry Bransford said:
Then you missed its obvious illustration of showing how a difference of only several ounces of lubricant amount wouldn't make a significant difference. Which is why I suggested it in this thread.
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After tilting the pinion up 10 or so degrees, have you confirmed that it’s only a few ounces? It might be more than you think.
 
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