how do you remove a driveshaft?

[Hans Efde]

Today I had another problem. How do you remove a driveshaft? I need to remove the hub and driveshaft fromt the present subframe and install them in the new subframe. I had seen a few video's on youtube where a mechanic explained that it would be simplest to cut the boot from the inner CV. That CV would fall in 2 pieces (the boot keeps them together) and then the shaft could be pulled out. So I did. On a Metro you end up with something like this:


Unfortunately the bearing housing with bearings is still too big to pull through the hole in the subframe. According to the Haynes you need a special tool to knock off the whole assembly. It seems to be held in place with a circlip. Does anyone have experience with this? Should I just hammer it off the driveshaft?

[Stuart]

Yes it should tap off using the drift on the centre part where the bearings are, if you use the end of the boot tube it will deform. It is also a possibility the outer CV will release first.

I have a Mini drive shaft that I've hammered to death and still can't get the inner pot joint to release from the shaft, hopefully you won't have that trouble

[manifold]

Hans. There is a captive circlip holding it on, same as the outer CV joint which (SHOULD) release if you give it a whack. Like Stuart says, the tube sometimes deforms and you might need to grind the buggers off. All is not lost though as you can fit bog standard inner CV mini ones which are about £25 or so each as a straight swap. How do I know this? Because thats what I now use on my Ti shafts. I can't for the life of me understand why they needed to do a different inner one for the mini to the metro....same splines and same overall depth.

Sometimes the circlip jams (or rusts solid) as you pop it out and then your having to use brute force.

[Rich]

Lever the balls out of the cage, it isn't difficult. You'll then be able to wriggle the shaft and cage through the hole.

One job to do on the frame I have as spare is to enlarge the hole the shaft passes through to enable the whole lot to be removed as one assembly.

[manifold]

Sometimes you can't Rich. The oval hole isn't always the same....one of mine was narrower and still couldn't pull though.... Its worth trying that first though.

[mikeeskriett]

Yup there are three types of frame, 4 point mounting, early with a smaller shaft hole and the more common later style. That said it should still go through the hole I normally pop the balls out (snigger here) and slide the cage back down the driveshaft and turn it diagonally and tap it through the hole. There is a knack to it but I spent far too much time in the back of Adrians brother Clive's garage salvaging parts from bent subframes so have it sussed.

Cheers,

Mike

[Rich]

Mines the later 4 point mounting frame though I've managed the same trick on an early-ish Mk1 I used to own.

[mikeeskriett]

The 4 point mounting frame is the really early cars W and X reg before they changed to use the Y piece mounting on the end of the gearbox. I'm not sure why they changed the design to be honest. Then again it seemed to take them a while to perfect the design because even after the went to the 3 point Y piece design the offside rear mount was vulnerable to fatigue cracks so ended up being made of much thicker steel...In the dictionary under sad b'stard it says to see this post :-p

[Rich]

Sorry Mike, I misunderstood which points you were referring to. My Mk1 had the mounting points of the older system IIRC but was fitted with the later mounts. The was on a Y plate from memory.

The frame in my Midas started life in a mk2.

[mikeeskriett]

it's another rover oddity a 3 point mounting with 4 mounting rubbers, similar to the Trident airliner the worlds only 3 engine airliner with 5 engines!!! :-p

They switched on an X plate from memory my 82 Y plate Metro had the 3 point mounting it was one of the few real bits of metal on the car when I got it. That was a heap when I bought it, 998 pov spec white where it wasn't rusty with orange vinyl seats and very little else.

Difficult to tell on mine when I got it it was running Mk1 bottom arms and Mk2 top arms so it's anyones guess where the bits came from