One piece driveshaft

16734 Views 91 Replies 39 Participants Last post by AAIIIC, 7 mo ago

ctsvflorida

Discussion Starter · Aug 29, 2006

I know the driveshaft is a two piece or three piece...whatever! My friend changed his in his GTO and what a difference to power to the wheels it made! Can we do this mod and what are the negatives to doing it? I am surprised to have not heard this question yet on here but maybe I missed it. Looking forward to the replies and answers! Thanks in advance!

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RacerV

· #41 · Nov 29, 2006

Has anyone done a conversion to a one piece drive shaft?
if so, can you post information about the parts, the process, and your thoughts on the conversion?
specifically, has the "clunk" been reduced?

1QUICKV

· #42 · Nov 29, 2006

I don't think anyone has done it yet, but it has been talked about before "do a search" And the "clunk noise" comes from the trans or the rear end. it's when you put torque on the trans or rear end it fills the play in the trans or the rear end, thats what i believe. but i've looked long and hard at the v's drive shaft and it looks as it needs help.

cts-v ls6

· #43 · Dec 1, 2006

The clunk comes from the dual mass flywheel that is 2 piece design with springs. Replace with a solid flywheel and there is no more clunk.

Jack

ace996

· #44 · Dec 1, 2006

"The Clunk" comes from not just one thing, but many. It starts from the dual-mass flywheel and ends...well, it never ends. Let's just say that if you did everything needed to rid yourself of "The Clunk", you'd have a much lighter wallet.

There are endless posts on the clunk, but not many involving a one-piece shaft...but it would help.

Be good,
Tom

Florian

· #45 · Dec 1, 2006

In a month or so, I will have a 1 piece driveshaft, along with 2.5 in. diam. halfshafts and a C3 Vette rear......pix to follow.

F

1QUICKV

· #46 · Dec 1, 2006

its the play in the rear or the tran. the drive shaft has the play and the fly wheel gives no play so it cant clunk as much, thats what i think. the drive shaft does not move freely so then there is no clunk on the drive shaft and "less" clunk.

c5racr1

· #47 · Dec 1, 2006

I have a LS7 flyweel and clutch and still have clunk.

1QUICKV

· #48 · Dec 1, 2006

c5racr1 said:
I have a LS7 flyweel and clutch and still have clunk.

i agree with you thats why i say the clunk comes from the play in the tran and rear.

atdeneve

· #49 · Dec 2, 2006

1QUICKV said:
its the play in the rear or the tran. the drive shaft has the play and the fly wheel gives no play so it cant clunk as much, thats what i think. the drive shaft does not move freely so then there is no clunk on the drive shaft and "less" clunk.

Oooohhhhh, I see! Thanks for clearin that one up fer me. Makes perfect sense now.

Man, do I love reading your posts! Does a great job of clearin the cranial sinuses. Do another one! Again! One more time. Please!

SlvrVee

· #50 · Aug 13, 2010

4

I had a local driveshaft shop install a one piece driveshaft for me three weeks ago and it works great with no vibrations at all. I wanted to make sure that it was vibration free before I posted, because I know in the past there was a little debate about using a one piece in the V. He “custom “ made it by doing a little Frankenstein work, using the part of the stock driveshaft that attaches to the diff and mating it to an old 3” shaft that he had laying around. After removing the diff end of the drive shaft he inserted a short piece of steel tubing and welded it. He then balanced this piece by itself and made sure it was true. This worked great because it was essentially the “old” driveshaft end going back into the diff so it was perfectly aligned. Pic 1 & 2 shows what I mean
I had two issues when it was first installed. I had a bad vibration that turned out to be that my tires were out of balance. Took it to Firestone and had them road force balanced and aligned now it’s smooth. The other issue was that under really hard acceleration and quick shifting the diff end of the driveshaft would flex and briefly touch the body. This only happened when shifting aggressively, so I called Max and picked up a CS diff bushing, problem solved no more flex. The car now drives so much better. Now when you shift it engages right away with a positive feel. As soon as you let go of the clutch the car moves. Plus no more clunking.

Pic 1 tube welded to old DS diff end

Pic 2 How it looks installed

Pic 3 Another View

Pic4 DS installed

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BadVMan

· #51 · Aug 13, 2010

thanks for the info, this is great news! Now GForce1320 just needs to make this available for all the V guys!

SlvrVee

· #52 · Aug 13, 2010

This is the Transmission end

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Doctornick

· #53 · Aug 13, 2010

Very nice. How fast have you gone with the new shaft? How high have you rev'd the motor? Banged any gears yet? Any weird noises or harmonics on the highway?

Houdini

· #54 · Aug 13, 2010

Thanks for the info and the pics. If you don't mind, what did something like this cost?

GFORCE1320

· #55 · Aug 13, 2010

Nice! This just prooves that 2 piece shafts are NOT required

BadVMan

· #56 · Aug 13, 2010

GFORCE1320 said:
Nice! This just prooves that 2 piece shafts are NOT required

Sweet!

maxspeed96ct

· #57 · Aug 13, 2010

Awsome thread, go out there and bang some gears and keep us updated.

SlvrVee

· #58 · Aug 13, 2010

Doctornick said:
Very nice. How fast have you gone with the new shaft? How high have you rev'd the motor? Banged any gears yet? Any weird noises or harmonics on the highway?

I took it up to about 125 with no problems. I also pulled each gear i.e 1st to almost redline then let it coast and listened and felt for any noise or vibes. Did the same for 2nd, 3rd and so on without anything. I also drove in 3rd for a bit on the hway, then 4th and 5th, again nice and smooth (with the exception of a very slight vibe that I get due to my UUC motor and trany mounts)

I got a great break on the price because on the DS because it was an old shaft from some unknown vehicle that they had laying around so I just paid for the u-joints the fab work for the diff end of the shaft and labor. Total was about $350- $400.

They had wanted to do a one piece aluminum shaft, but I decided against it because to safely handle 500 to 600 rhp it would have be fabbed from 4" aluminum, which would require the support where the center bearing hangs to be banged in a little to provide good clearance. Since I wasn't too sure if this was gonna work I didn't want to mess up that support in case I had to go back with a stock DS. Matt the guy who put this ds together said that I could use 3.5 alum and it would still support high hp, but the 4" would have been for insurance. Right now I'm at 475 rwhp and 457 tq (maggie + cams) in a couple of weeks will be heads and the 90mm intake on the maggie, so I wanted a little insurance.

Yesterday I had a set of Dunlop Direzza Z1 mounted an all I can say is wow. With the new DS, the Dunlops and the level 4 Monster clutch this car hooks up like a beast. Chris looks I'm gonna need a set of them new heavy duty axles soon....

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deedubb

· #59 · Aug 14, 2010

GFORCE1320 said:
Nice! This just prooves that 2 piece shafts are NOT required

*cough* Now if someone could finish one in CF or aluminum for a lighter setup *cough*

SlvrVee

· #60 · Aug 14, 2010

JUST ONE MORE PIC

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