transfercase only spins passanger side shaft.

[97RangerDanger123]

been reading fourms for years but this my first post to a fourm ever, so dont kill me guys and gals.

1997 ranger xlt 4x4 3.0 208k miles, automatic hubs for now.

1. 4x4 didnt work when i tried it the other day so i took the auto hubs off and cleaned em up with brake cleaner and found them to look different, no chunks of gears or anything but the passanger side is definantly toast, its missing the whole middle gear. so im buying new hubs and they will be manual locking warn hubs.

2. I lifted the truck off the ground with the front tires off to check and make sure everything was spinning and working correct before i purchase my hubs and conversion kit (going manual). Passenger side everything spins and works great. drivers side not so much, i put the truck in 4hi and 1st gear and released the clutch and let it idle, the whole drivers axle seems to be in a bind it only spins when i help twist it by hand. also it spun a tiny bit when i gave it a little gas.

3. no weird noises or anything when its in 4x4 or anything, it just dosent want to spin on the passengers side, it feels bound up or something, i tried 4hi and 4lo and gave it a little gas and nothing really, and im curious what i should do in this situation. thanks for your help.

 

[adsm08]

You should do nothing. You have an open front diff, so under the conditions you tested it only the wheel with the least resistance will spin. I am assuming this test was done hubs on, which would add the rotor and wheel to the resistance of the side that locked in, but even if that assumption is faulty it only makes the results odd, not un-normal. And it only makes them odd because the passenger shaft is longer, so it should weigh more.

Get your new hubs and get them on, then redo the test but hold the passenger wheel still somehow. Hands are not recommended, but can be done. The other wheel should spin. Or since you are going manual hubs just lock only the passenger side. Results should be the same.

 

[Curious Hound]

First off, welcome to the forum. We won't kill you. This is one of the friendly forums. There is an extremely helpful and knowledgable group here.

In your post, you seem to have confused which side is messed up. In one place you say driver side doesn't work. In another, you say passenger side doesn't work. It doesn't matter to me. But for your own sake, you need to keep it straight. I can think of 2 places where trouble could be that would cause this.

First, the easier, cheaper thing to check. Wheel bearings and spindle bearings. If the wheel spins fine in 2-wheel drive and doesn't wobble or have excess play, then the wheel bearings are probably ok. But where the drive shaft goes through the spindle, there is a seal and a needle bearing. If they have been neglected, there could be dirt in there or just a dry, partially frozen bearing. This would cause binding. With an open (non-locking) differential, this would cause all the power to go to the side with less resistance - the good side in this case. Having both wheels off the ground as in the test you did, will make this problem show up easily.

Second, would be a problem inside the differential. Bad bearing, broken gear teeth, broken or bent axle drive shaft, etc.

Either problem will require you to remove the wheel, brake calipers, rotor and axle drive shaft on the affected side - possibly more if the problem turns out to be internal to the differential. On the driver side, the axle should slide out of the differential and you will be able to see the spindle bearing and seal as well as Inspecting the shaft surface where this bearing rolls (called the journal). If it's the passenger side, you can unclamp the rubber boot where the 2-part shaft is splined and just remove the outer end of the shaft. Be sure to mark the shaft so you can put it back together in the right orientation. The two u-joints on that shaft must be lined up properly to prevent binding and breakage. Be careful to keep dirt out of all bearings and the differential.

Eric B

 

[wildbill23c]

Auto locking hubs, you removed the hubs then tried your test? This may be your problem, one of the hubs was actually engaged the other is not, so if one side is in free and one is locked you have those exact symptoms.

Try all this again with known good working hubs and let us know the results. Until then its a guess as to what is really happening.

 

[fr7]

So what year did they start putting pulse vacuum hubs on the rangers? Was it 97 or 98? and up to what year? I'm uncertain...

 

[BlackBII]

So what year did they start putting pulse vacuum hubs on the rangers? Was it 97 or 98? and up to what year? I'm uncertain...

1998 was the first year, and it went until mid 2000 or 2001. 1997 was the last year of the TTB Ranger.