MT Rebuild Questions

[dgeesaman]

I'm rebuilding an open-diff transmission for a 97 Maxima. I 'rebuilt' it already, but it made noise and I've found it's due to some score marks on the face of the mainshaft output pinion. I found a better mainshaft and input shaft, and I want to pull the newly-installed bearings and put them on this substitute set.

I have a few questions:

1) If I pull the the bearings using a 2-jaw gear puller and avoid any whacking/hammering, will they still be good for use on the new mainshaft? (The puller will only grab the outer race, and of course the fit is tight around the inner race).

2) One of the tapered roller bearings is pressed down flush against the output pinion, and the inner race has the same dia as the tips of the gear teeth, so I can't get jaws 'behind' it to pull it off. Since I would prefer to reuse it, I can't pull it off by the cage. Can it be pulled without damage? I see those bearing splitter tools - can I use one of those and tighten the sides of the splitter together to start moving the bearing off to create space b/t the bearing and pinion, before finally pulling it? Or shouldn't I use a splitter that way?Splitter: http://www.toolsource.com/ost/...g%3D3

3) Are mainshafts generally consistent in length, or will I need to measure and re-shim for the endplay/preload in the transmission housing again?

Dave
Modified by dgeesaman at 2:21 AM 1/26/2006