I've always talked to/emailed with you - it was a bad joke since I figured Tom was retired and was going to be hard to hear from. I couldn't remember your handle on here to tag you!
You guys do great work!
New Tom Wood driveshaft question
- Thread starter PRNDL
- Start date
You guys do great work!
I figured it was! But you never know, we still sometimes get calls where people have their heart set on talking to Tom personally.
We *normally* do great work. Sometimes we leave extra needle bearings on the trunnions of the u-joints.
Most certainly a joke for the express purpose of making a big mountain out of a tiny molehill.
Oh, it's kinda like my printer giving me a bonus blank sheet of paper every so often
I have been buying driveshafts from Tom Woods for almost 20 years and their customer service has always been outstanding.
Around 2007 our group had an NAXJA event in Moab where a stretched TJ owner with a 4.7L stroker had twisted his rear driveshaft. The TJ owner contacted Tom who made a special trip ("GOOD PR") to our event to drop off the new driveshaft so the TJ owner could get back on the trails. Didn't hurt that several members of our group were friends of Toms, but still.... that is what you call Customer Service....
Around 2007 our group had an NAXJA event in Moab where a stretched TJ owner with a 4.7L stroker had twisted his rear driveshaft. The TJ owner contacted Tom who made a special trip ("GOOD PR") to our event to drop off the new driveshaft so the TJ owner could get back on the trails. Didn't hurt that several members of our group were friends of Toms, but still.... that is what you call Customer Service....
Thanks Shawn!I don't know why it's being said to not accept my answer and to only accept an answer from Tom but you'll have to settle for my answer. Tom (my dad) is for all intents and purposes retired. I still talk to him several times a week about the business but regarding day to day things he no longer comes into the shop and I am acting as the General Manager. It has been that way for over a year now. My full name is Shawn Thomas Wood so you could say that you are getting the answer from someone who is 2/3 Thomas Wood.
Now that I have addressed that awkward concern/issue or maybe joke, I can tell you where that needle bearing came from. When we paint the shafts, to avoid getting paint on the exposed bearing caps, we remove them and replace them with "paint caps". The paint caps are basically just bearing caps that we use over and over to essentially mask the joint and keep that part of the joint paint free. When the pain is dry we remove the paint caps, put the normal caps back on, then grease (where applicable) and wrap up the shaft. I am very sure that one of the needle bearings in one of the paint caps fell over and stuck to the end of the trunnion. When swapping back over to the normal cap we didn't notice the rogue needle bearing. This is something we should have caught though and I'm sorry that we didn't. All that being said the solution is indeed to remove that needle bearing, throw it away, and put the cap back on.
You can rest assured that there are not downed needle bearings in the other caps as this would create enough interference that we would not have been able to get the snap rings installed.
Come now Shawn, you and I have both seen snap rings installed and the end busted out of the cap. WE WILL MAKE IT GO, NO MATTER WHAT. But hey, we got the snap rings in, right?
One more reason I advocate using a 16 oz hammer to install u-joints. We're installing joints, not forging a broadsword.
We're not forging broadswords, we're installing u joints.
These stupid OE ones I hate. Specially when one starts clicking on the trail and we have to swap it.
I have a MAP torch in the truck box now for starting campfires and cooking u joints.
Vtx531
TJ Addict
It is apparent you have never done any volume painting.
Well, when I call down to the Ford parts department I speak to Henry and only Henry.