Driveshafts

[jgmc]

Can anyone tell me if there's a difference in driveshafts from a 1/2 coil spring truck and a 1/2 ton leaf spring truck. Also wondering about the heavy duty carrier bearing and the regular bearing. I'm think about switching a driveshaft with the heavy duty bearing.

[bigmac73]

subscribing

[jmorri34]

I went from LB leaf spring to coil spring setup and used the same driveshaft!

[72bbblu]

There is a difference in the way the center yoke works on a leaf sprung versus a coil sprung truck. The leaf spring is a slip yoke while the coil spring is a fixed position thru-bolted yoke. The reason for this is that the control arms on the coil sprung truck are attached at a point where as the suspension travels, the arc remains roughly the same as the drive shaft arc. On a leaf sprung truck, the travel is much more straight up and down, requiring the slip yoke in the middle.

I know of people who have used one in the other. I guess a slip yoke would work fine in a leaf spring truck. Problems could arise using a fixed yoke on a leaf spring truck...particularly if the truck will see a lot of suspension travel. You can likely get by that way because the center bearing is rubber mounted and will allow a certain amount of give, but it's not the optimum situation.

[brad_man_72]

What 72 said, while the light duty carrier does allow for sme movement fore and aft of the driveshaft it doesn't allow for the movement it would see on a leaf spring rear end. This is why all modern leaf spring trucks have a slip in the rear shaft.
You can get solid light duty carrier bearings, but you would have to add a slip and stub to the rear shaft.