Installing Mini Spool and Gears

[hispeedvp]

as the title says im installing a mini spool and some 3.89 diff gears in my ute, have never takled anything diff related before, any pointers? have been told crown wheel bolts are reverse thread? my brother is third year mech and im always stripping and rebuilding engines, installing a supercharger to an eco tech recently, so i think we can handle it together,

is there anything inparticular that i might find handy to know?

[lukas pukas]

theres an awesme thread on calaisturbo on mini spools and how to install, might pay to check that out. just do a search

[JD]

try looking up mini spool in a search on here, or have a look in the how-to section, it gets asked pretty often so i reckon there would be a howto

[immortality]

installing the minispool is the easy part, all you need to do is jack car up on stands,and drain oil from diff. whilst your waiting for that to happen, remove both rear wheels, brake calipers and rotors. make sure hand brake is off to pull the rotors off. undo 4 bolts holding each axle in and pull axles out. remove back cover (some times it easier if you also remove the panhard rod to give yourself room to work with) off the diff, undo the 2bolts each side securing the diff carier and pull the whole assembly out. make sure you keep the bearing cups on the correct sides with the shims so that everything goes back together in the same position etc.

then all you gotta do is split the carrier, remove spider gears and fit minispool in it's place and re-assemble everything.


crown wheel bolts 145nm (left hand thread)
bearing cap bolts 60nm
diff cover bolts 31nm
axle retaining nuts 55nm



thats the easy part changing the crown wheel and pinion is a little more difficult cause you need to ensure you set the correct backlash and wear patern on the gears or they won't last very long at all.

if you intend to do the gears yourself there is a slight variation on the above dis-assembly procedure. before removing the wheels, brake calipers and disk rotors you need to drop the driveshaft (hold the nuts and undo the bolts, the nuts are up against a shoulder and will only turn a little befor jamming) i also give em a spray with CRC first just to help loosen things a little. have an assistant apply the brakes so that you can undo the pinion nut which is bloody tight.

then you can continue to dis assemble as before, once the carrier is out you will be able to remove the pinion as well. take note of where the shims are etc. re-assembly is reverse of above except it would probably require a few assembles/dis-assembles to set the correct back lash etc

crownwheel to pinion backlash 0.10-0.18mm

unless you have access to the proper equipment i'd recomend leaving the changing of gears to a profesional outfit, they will be able to set the gears up properly etc so they last a long time and you would get some sort of warranty on there work also or just reassemble with your excisting shims etc and see what it does, if it's not noisy and the backlash seems ok drive it otherwise take to diff shop and have em do it for you

[azzfox]

theres an awesme thread on calaisturbo on mini spools and how to install, might pay to check that out. just do a search

Installing a "SPOOL" - calaisturbo.com.au

^ that the one? ^

[lukas pukas]

yes yes yes!

[hispeedvp]

is there any other way of spreading the diff to remove the carrier other than the chain idea on the calais turbo thread?

[RabidDog_12345]

is there any other way of spreading the diff to remove the carrier other than the chain idea on the calais turbo thread?

using a proper diff spreader

[hispeedvp]

am going to make my own i think

[VN_Luke]

or you can just do it the normal person way, and pry the center out by levering against the diff housing and one of the crownwheel bolts.

[hispeedvp]

didnt really try levering, thought it might be a waste of time, will give it a go tommorow

[immortality]

i used a pry bar (similar to a crow bar, just a bit smaller) and it works great, slide it behind the carrier, against the face of the pinion and against the body of the carrier. simple really. don't see the need for a chain at all

[hispeedvp]

diff is now mini spooled, anyone want to buy some 3.89 diff gears

[V85000i]

how is it with the spool, i'm fitting mine this weekend.

[hispeedvp]

awesome, have putt some stockie rims on mind you there 225 50 r15 and there bulging of the rims :P vibrates like hell when cournering but because its a ute i think it skips around the courner prity easy, heaps more control when side ways though its unberlievible and more importantly the vibration i was getting from my rooted lsd is gone.

[KRUPTD]

Whats involved and how hard is it to put a mini spool into a VN LSD diff?????

[stocky]

Whats involved and how hard is it to put a mini spool into a VN LSD diff?????

just get a single spinner diff centre and fit it to that

[UNKNOWN]

Everyones going spool!!!

[FATMAT]

I'm spooling my single pegger realy soon, prob next fortnite. KRUPTD i would keep the lsd as a back up mate, don't ruin the lsd by replacing it with a spool center.

HISPEEDVP What $ do you want for the diff gears mate??

[hispeedvp]

to put a mini spool in an lsd you need to get the pins from an open centre to hold the hemisphere, lsd does not have these.

[vnv8driver]

why would you want a spool on an lsd diff? if your not spinning 2 wheels off the mark and even flattening it around bends its stuffed, just rebuild your diff. people say the lsd's arent very strong, but they are.....are just as strong as the rest of the drivetrain.

[tubbed383]

why would you want a spool on an lsd diff? if your not spinning 2 wheels off the mark and even flattening it around bends its stuffed, just rebuild your diff. people say the lsd's arent very strong, but they are.....are just as strong as the rest of the drivetrain.

borg warner lsd's are more useless then tits on a bull. wear out quite quickly.

another thing, im constantly seeing young blokes getting minispools fitted, then proceeding to break axels and what not and say spools are ****... LEARN HOW TO DRIVE BOYS daily driven minispooled vn calais here, 15mths and not one problem... except tyre wear hehe

[slo_firo]

i used a pry bar (similar to a crow bar, just a bit smaller) and it works great, slide it behind the carrier, against the face of the pinion and against the body of the carrier. simple really. don't see the need for a chain at all

Hey man did you find your mini spool in NZ or get it sent from aus?

have a mate with an open wheel wagon.... and my lsd is worn so thinking about putting another diff in and spooling it (to poor to afford re-build right now)

[immortality]

Hey man did you find your mini spool in NZ or get it sent from aus?

have a mate with an open wheel wagon.... and my lsd is worn so thinking about putting another diff in and spooling it (to poor to afford re-build right now)

i'm currently running a tightened LSD which is working well and cops a bit of abuse along the way. next time round i'm going to use a minispool on my toy car. even with the LSD the missus doesn't like to drive it as she complains "it slides to easy"

where abouts are you? it would probably be cheaper to get it from aussie but try some local outfits and see if they can supply one. if your in auckland try either steelie gears (tony) he's been around for a long time and does a lot of diffs for race cars and dragsters etc. he's in onehunga (south auckland)

[slo_firo]

yea Papakura boys lol.... so south auckland is good. i would rather re-build my lsd but am pretty brok atm....

mate still wants a spool though for his wagon so ill give steelie gears a call then