Well I don't know what kind of punk did this to a nice car like mine before I bought it. I guess I only paid 500 bucks for it, BUT THATS NOT THE POINT! I've replaced few transmission parts (slave cyl, starter, sensors, ect) but the cv shafts is where I'm having major problems. I annihalated the driver side one when hitting a ditch. I have fixed that one. It took a few days shopping around at parts stores until i got lucky. (92 cv shafts are different than the 89 ones so don't even try.) It turns out 89 cavaliers don't usually have ABS brakes, but my 92 does. Somehow i got lucky and found one. Not so lucky for the passenger side. See the 92 cv shafts have a female inner shaft. Didn't fit. 89 cv shafts have a male end.
I gave up a while ago on finding one with abs, so i figured i don't need it. More fun without it anyways. So i bought the $60 rebuilt shaft for an 89 cavalier with a 5 speed, installed it, put everything back together properly (don't question my mechanic skills!) and wanted to take it for a spin. The car backed up about 10 feet before "POP" the snap ring on the inner shaft gave loose.
After getting it back on jack stands, I put the shaft back in with a rubber mallet. seemed tight. Another failed attempt of backing out of the driveway made me mad. Now thank you for listening to my story so now I'll tell you my problem and Idea for solving it. Need input people!!
The shaft is about 2 inches too short. The axle nut on the wheel bearing pulled the shaft right out of the tranny. The snap ring is fine and nothing broke. The inner splines on the tranny are also fine.
My Idea was to lengthen the cv shaft myself. I have another cv shaft from a 92 that I'm going to use the outer end with the abs exciter ring along with the inner 89 transmission end. An angle grinder with a cutoff wheel should do the trick. Cut the shaft as straight as possible, messure it out, slip a tough pipe over it and weld it in place. Theres my idea for custom building my own cv shaft. Any questions or concerns will gladly be appreciated. Thank you for playing.
