Torque rods... pure evil

[pfarber]

I think I finally have beaten the evil gods of torque rod hell.

All it took is about 5000F of pure oxy-acetylene goodness.. aka I heated it up, well, the casting anyway..

I think I am becoming an expert at reading the temp of a part by how much the paint starts to smoke

Yeah, the TM says use a special claw bar and hit the casting... good luck with that on a truck that's been sitting for 10+ years.

Heat it, hit the bolt with a hammer and out she pops. Life is good.

Pics tomorrow..

[pfarber]

Here are some pics of the rear rear axle finally getting freed from the torque rods.

Keeping the drive shaft from the pillow block to the rear axle connected was done to keep the rear from shifting. Tires were chocked but with jacks under the torsion bar seats things could still shift.

Front torque bar off and out of the seat. Heat and a hammer did the trick. I actually only burned off the OD, the Red Oxide primer did not burn off. Gotta keep that torch moving!

The reason for doing the front end first is this... no real way to get a hammer in there. So I removed the front pins, slid the read axle off the springs and rotated it 180deg so the torque bar is on the top.

Here's the end result. Axle unhooked, and can now be worked on without all the other parts in the way. Storage will also be much simpler.