can't shim posi

[alwaysneedmore]

so I bought a used stock posi carrier a number of years ago and had it installed. it's always howled a little bit especially turning a corned to the right.
Last week I figured out that I needed to rebuild it so I did.
In trying to remove the carrier, I had to drive the C-clip on the left side out with a punch, and the right side clip fell out by itself.
I thought that when I reinstalled it, I would have to shim it to the left a bit more to be able to get the c clip in easier.
I measured the backlash and it's around 10 - 12 thou, so I'm pretty sure I can't shim the carrier left.

Has anybody ever seen anything like this before??? I think the howl is from the backlash but I won't be able to install the axle if I reduce the backlash any more.

thanks,
nathan

 

[denn454]

sounds like you have some problems. it shouldn't howl at all. thats what a shim is going to do for you. get some gear marking stuff and shim it going off what you see on the gears. i can't really explain how to do it, but you want the gear to be hitting evenly on all parts of the teeth.

as for the c-clip. push the axel all the way in from the outside, then the clip should just slide right in. or maybe you have the wrong c-clip.

 

[alwaysneedmore]

Thanks Denn454 for the suggestions.
Turns out I have bigger problems than that.
I measured the splines of each axle, and the left side spine is about 0.080 shorter than the right side which means that the axle can't travel far enough into the side gear to allow the c-clip out easily
Calling on axle experts: is there a reason why I can't swap the left and right axles?? The car's had some torque put through it and has ~80k miles on it. Will reversing the torque direction on the axle cause it to fail?