[TR] pinion flange torque

[Randall]

> Just seems so extreme. I can't see from the drawings, but 
> does't the flange torque against the front pinon bearing?  

Not against the bearing itself, but against the inner race of the bearing.  There is a fairly large amount of force on that shaft &
bearings, and it is essential that the gear on the end of the shaft be held accurately in position relative to the ring gear it
drives.  So there is a precision spacer (and those shims I mentioned before) that fit between the inner races of both bearings on
the shaft.  When you reef down on the nut, it clamps the entire stack of flange, input bearing inner race, shims, spacer and the
pinion bearing inner race against the pinion gear.  In this case, there is some force applied to the bearings (the preload I
mentioned before), but that force is set by the thickness of the shims.  However, if the shims were installed a little thicker, you
could actually have some clearance in the bearings even with the 100 ftlb torque.

BTW, the range of torque is so you can pull to the bottom value, then tighten some more as necessary to line up the holes in the nut
& shaft.  Don't forget there are two holes in the shaft, so it can't take more than 1/12 turn to line them up.  In the very rare
case where the holes don't line up within the torque range, you may need to sand or file a bit off the back of the nut and try
again.

Randall