ok guys i need help , im changing u joints on the front prop shaft and ive gotten it loose from the front diff but it will not slide off the output shaft of the tranny. Im sure this thing hasnt been greased in years so thats prolly why it stuck , i need some tips on how to free it up and get it off !!! any help is appreciated and thanks in advance !!!!! oh yea ita 2004.5 sportsman 700 efi

 

Best way without busting your knuckles with a punch and hammer is to use an air impact on the yoke body to drive it forward off the gear case shaft. Have the front yoke to the left of the front diff so it can clear it and should impact right off.

 

OK I finally got access to a air hammer , it moved forward about a half inch and now won't budge no more !!! Its right at the start of the splines and stops ! It will slide back pretty easy ! I made sure nothing was hitting from the rest of the shaft and stopping it ! This damn thing bout to get the best of me !!!¡

 

PB Blaster/Wd40 on the splines and heat the yoke with a torch. Impact it back and forth a little.May have to do this a couple times,but the yoke will pop off the shaft. IF the yoke splines are worn,may have jumped teeth on the shaft and will be harder to remove,but will come off. The shaft splines are way harder than the prop shaft yoke so it shouldn't be hurt. If the yoke splines are damaged,it'd be cheaper to replace the prop shaft as any assembly rather than trying to rebuild it.Hopefully it's just frozen from corrosion over the years.

 

Oh and on top of all that , i see water dripping out of the water pump weep hole ! Im assuming its the water pump seal thsts leaking on it ? Im sure ill be asking for advice on that too !

 

Yep,water pump seal leaking..Always seems like when you're fixing one thing you look around and find something else that needs repairing. Had to call a lot of people over the years on things like this to get approval to repair something else that wasn't on the original repair order..

 

Ok so I tried heating it up and hammering it off and didn't work! What other options do I have ? I thought about getting a cutting torch and cutting the yoke down the middle , scared it may hurt the tranny output shaft tho ! Is there any other options ??

 

Man,I've never had one that I couldn't get off someway or another. Cutting torch may not be the best way if you damage the gear case shaft splines. Hard to get a cutting wheel in this area unless you are able to get to it from underneath,but more controllable as far as depth.You could possibly cut a V notch taking care not to hit the shaft splines and see if you could break a section of the yoke away. Then it should be easy to remove what's left.

 

Man that damn thing will slide right to where the splines about to start and jus stop ! It'll slide back and forth with no problem but jus wont go no further ! It's like there's something at the end of the yoke that's keeping it from sliding off the splines ! I'm gonna hafta have a new prop shaft for sure , this one is fubar ! I guess I'll try getting under it and hopefully the cutting wheel will be able to reach it !

 

Ok so I was thinking , jus how hot should I get it ? All I had was a lil hand help propane torch , it got hot but maybe it didn't get hot enough ?