Tore the front axle down this week and have never messed with king pins before. The bushing on the drivers side came out in two pieces the other side was solid. Found the kits to rebuild with and was wondering what to look for to see if the pin itself needs replacement. Any suggestions? While we're in it how bout the bottom ones? Been reading alot of king pin info on here but none showing a good one and a worn out one. Any advice would be appreciated. Also any pics would be great too.

 

Are you sure you really searched ?????




Mark did a great writeup on them...

https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...light=king+pin

 

Yep read that one and many others also read one on pirate that was good. The best I have come up with is whether or not its pitted. Mine is not pitted so does that mean its good to go?

 

In my opinion, if you are already in there, the truck has a bunch of miles, you are at all worried about them, go ahead and replace them. The peace of mind is worth the cost and effort. Did you measure the springs? Mine were considerably compressed, but I could not tell until I measured them. Also, the lowers were bad and one was cracked and possibly near failure...Mark

 

X2 lots of pics also

 

I haven't measured yet was planning on at least changing the bushing,gasket,and the spring just to be safe. I will post some pics tonight of the pins themselves and see what you think about them. Some people say ir they are not worn out to leave them because they are so hard to change.

 

I was fretting that also, but a member on this site, I don't recall who, said to me the same that I said to you. With the leverage, 8' in my case, it was easy. The first side I used heat, pb blaster, heat, etc., and it popped off. The other side, I decided to just try the leverage and it popped off just as easily. I have a 1", 2000 fp impact and that did not work, so I would go straight to leverage. A member here calculated that a 150 pound dead weight (me) on the end of an 8' lever generated about 1200 pounds. That does not include the dynamic effects of your muscles, which would push it up considerably. I think the fact that you got it apart as far as it is is more than enough ability to do it...Mark

 

Thanks a bunch ill keep you posted.

 

If you've got a cheater bar that's strong enough and long enough to wrench on the pins, go for it. However, I just did mine and my pins looked fine with no real visible wear marks, so I decided not to replace them. Both of my nylon bushing were distorted enough though that they would rock side-to-side on the pin, so they definitely needed to be replaced. The bearing at the bottom was also fine, but I'd bought the kit so I just replaced it too.

 

with the age of our trucks and usually the high miles, I like to just do the whole shabang and be done with it for another 10-15 years

 

I have a few kingpins at home with some minor wear, could post pics later if you like.

I just change them for piece of mind.

 

Never mind bout whether they need changing the driver side has significant discoloration and scoring the pass side does too just not as bad. So I guess ill be trying my hand with 600 pounds of torque. Any ideas on how to do that with the axle laying in the floor ? I would put pics but kit wont let me upload them from my phone.

 

When i had my axle out of the truck to do the 4x4 coversion on my crew cab and was rebuilding the whole thing, what i did was take my 83 Ramcharger and actually pulled it up to just touching the axle tube to hold it down w/ the weight of the vehicle, not enough to actually put any pressure on the axle tube itself. Then i just used a cheater pipe on the end of a huge allen key and was able to use my weight by stepping on the cheater pipe to break the king pins loose to replace them. used the same method when i torqued them to spec..."dang tight"

James

 

Good idea I dont have a ram charger but I can find something heavy. Thanks for the input.

 

I used a 36'' pipe wrench on the kingpin and come-along from it to the axle housing.