ok so i just picked up the axle. a friend of mine at a shop was gonna do it for nothing for me but then decided he wanted to charge. so i was thinkin of doing it myself. now this is the axle that has that bearing thing. how bad would it be to do in the driveway with no air tools? what size is the nut? any help appreaciated thanks

 

The autozone repair sticky is your friend....It has a good write up with good pics on the job....http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?t=396706

The socket for the nut is 36mm...you can rent it for free at autozone....

Edit: also dont forget to drain the tranny fluid or you will have a big mess on the ground when you pull the shaft....

 

I think I need to replace mine, as well. There has been a clunking coming from that wheel lately. Will that part cause premature tire wear? Just put on wheels with brand new tires and don't want to replace them anytime soon. Also, if I was planning on doing a 5-speed swap anytime soon should I go ahead and swap the axle now, or is it something major I should wait to do for a couple of months?

 

They will cluck-n-click around for a long time before they go....Just dont be doing any burn outs..until it's fixed...They will not affect your tire wear...

Wait on the axle change only if your SERIOUS about doing the swap...If not then change the axle....

 

Well, if it will last a little while and won't eat up my new tires, I think I can wait. Probably only another 6 weeks or so until the snow flies up here, that's when the Max goes into storage. While it's sitting I will do the tranny swap and put on new suspension. Wanted to have all that already done, but all it takes is TIME and $$$!

 

The 36mm axle nut is a beech to get off without impact wrench..I jumped up and down on my 89 with a 5 foot bar and no budge...impact wrench took er right off..pretty easy after that..I didnt drain the tranny..put a pan under it and only lost about a half a pint..make sure u buy a new retainer ring it will get boogered up....good luck

 

hardest part of the job is seperating and joining the bearing support. be prepared to control your temper.

i'd actually reccomend you wait untill you're ready to do the swap, skip the rh axle removal and go ahead and pull the tranny, then after it's out, give the end of the axle shaft 30 hard whacks with a hammer to pop it out. that's what i ended up doing. installation is also a pita, grease it up and hammer the knub where one of the bottom bolt threads into the support...careful not to break it off.

 

Mine was pretty well siezed up.

There are 3 12mm (I think) bolts that hold the axle to the bearing support. What I ended up doing was taking out the bolts (a minor PITA itself), then hammering on one of the bolthole ears to get the axle to rotate (relative to the support.

Then when I could see the face of one of the ears on the axle, I put a flathead screwdriver on it, and hammered it out of the tranny.
Be sure to put some anti-sieze on it before putting it back on.

The last time I did this, I was thinking that it might be easier if you just unbolted the support from the car, but I did not try this.

 

Thats exactly what I did and it worked pretty well. Except my auto tranny had been replaced 15k miles before breaking and prompting me to do the 5sp swap. Most of the bolts were pretty easy to get out because of that.

 

I have no power tools and can not find a looong steel pipe, so this is what i did to get it loose.
put the socket and break bar on, sit the handle of the break bar on jack stand, start the car, put it in right gear and move the car slowly(for driver side, go back; and for passenger side, move forward), use the weight of the car to do the job. works great for me.
CAUTION: break bar may bounce off to hit sb/sth.
make sure the direction is right, I end up bending my 1/2 break bar once.
do it at your own risk

 

you shouldn't be working on cars

 

Yikes.

I didn't have power tools. So I spent $140 at Big Al's.

 

i was just talkin to my buddy that just did his axle in his honda. he was able to do it in his driveway. he said as soon as the weather clears up here we should be able to do mine too. he has a 5 foot pole and a breaker bar. with the car on the ground he was able to break the nut on his loose pretty easily. that was also smaller than ours, but the same principal should work. im actually trying to get my friend with air tools to take out his portable set up.so now its just a matter of waiting for the rain to clear up.im not really sure but i think that the axle may be the original one. my driver side went about 6 monthss ago and i spent almost $300 to get that done. then i found out they ripped me off on the price of the axle. charged me almost $175 i bought one for $130-50 core. that really pissed me off. so thats why i dont really want to go back to a shop. THANKS for all the help

 

get PB blaster, its amazing. I snapped alot of bolts and studs off before i used it but that stuff is awsome.

~Alex

 

Before you actually try to get the axle nut off and it does not budge, you do not need to worry about a 5" pipe. I used a 2 1/2' breaker bar to loosen up mine and I am not the strongest guy either. It should be torqued to 200 lb-ft if I am not mistaken and that's not a whole lot of torque. Overtorquing that nut does not make the car run any better 'cause there is a cotter pin with a cap underneath it, which won't let the nut go off by itself.

 

This impact wrench is electric[wall plug].....I paid $65 for it at a bargain bin tool store...I was a little worried that it was going to be a piece of crap,but it has performed well above my expectations...It has had moderate use and i have had no problems...very tough..



If you do your own car work and can't or do not want to spend the $$ for the a compressor and impact wrench....I recommend this tool...