caltracs are getting installed tomorrow and i will be working on the pinion angle here soon. the thing is that i have a 2 piece driveshaft and this is my first rodeo. heres my question.

should my front end of the driveshaft and rear piece of the driveshaft be at the same exact angle, or should they be a little different. in my mind it makes most sense if both shafts were at exact angles going to the rear end. is that wrong?

i have the djm driveshaft carrier so i can change the angles of how the driveshaft goes to the rear end.

 

I did a 2 PC swap on my cew cab and use some info i got from a driveshaft shop. The shafts need to not be i a perfectly strait line. Of thats the only option then you need to offset the carrier bearing so there is some break in the strait line. It has to do wi the wear on the u-joints. If they are always wearing in the same spots it will destroy them. They need to be constanly moving. Its the same rule as your pinion angle, you never want it perfectly in line with the shaft. Mine is set up were most of the drop is in the second shaft. The setup is from a '05 ECSB, fits perfect in my CCSB, just had to build a crossmeber for the midshaft bearing. Hope this helps.

 

Yeah, you never want the angles to be 0. The ideal working angle is 1 degree. With no angle there is no force applied to the needle bearings in the universals and they don't spin and burn up.

I found this link helpful when I was playing with mine.
http://www.drivetrain.com/driveline_angle_problem.html

 

can someone dummy it down for me? i plan to point the pinion down 3-4* in relation to the driveshaft. what angles should i put the front piece of the driveshaft, what angle for the rear portion in relation to the front piece and what do i measure from to determin the rear pinion angle.

i lost myself in that ramble haha.

 

so i could technically adjust the pinion angle to where i want by lifting/lowering the DS carrier.

 

ya i guess you cold say that, but be sure to no go too crazy with it, if you think about it, you will have a hard time messing it up. a couple degrees at each pivot point and your good, its not like this is for something with allot of lift, or lengthy shafts.

 

im just trying to get my driveline finished and right. calvert recomended -2* of negative pinion angle in relation to the driveshaft. problem is i got two of those ho's haha. what if i just set the front section of the driveshaft in line with the transmission output shaft and let the second driveshaft sit wherever it needs to go to achieve -2* on the pinion in relation to the back half of the DS?

 

so i understand that i want atleast 1* difference at the pinion and rear section of the driveshaft, and atleast 1* difference at the slip yoke between the 2 driveshafts, but is it ok to set the front driveshaft at the exact angle as the output shaft on the transmission? the more i read, the more confused i get

 

To make it simple, you need that 2* at EVERY pivot point. If there is a u-joint, there needs to be some sort of change of angle at all of those points, even at the slip yoke. Your truck looks to be a ECSB. You should already be set up for this.

 

everything in the driveline is changed out back. 3" drop shackles, 2" drop hangers, removed overload springs, calvert traction bars, djm driveshaft carrier....things have been moved around.

after getting the cal-tracs installed yesterday i found a long smoothe road and did a 0-135 punch. ZERO vibes so i think im just guna leave it all alone. ill check and make sure that the pinion angle is at a negative degree, and if so it stays where its at. no point in fixing what aint brokethanks for the help guys