Axle differences
 

I am trying to replace the axles on my NA. The axles that I picked up from a Miata specialist Won't line up with the halfshafts on the diff side. the axles seem identical other than the fact that the bolt holes don't line up and the shaft that goes to the hub has a different gusset on it.
Can anyone tell me What axles I specifically need? In the second picture the axle on the right is what I pulled off the car and is much flatter on the mounting flange.
I tried searching but can't find any pictures of the different axles. I know the car has an LSD(supposedly Tomei) if that helps. I'm guessing it's got a 1.8 drivetrain upgrade but I'm not sure how to tell.
Thanks in advance!
http://bayimg.com/LAonhAadp


http://bayimg.com/MAOnfaaDp

what year/model do you have and why are you changing the axles?

I have a 93, I'm changing the axles because the boot is cracked and the axles are making popping noises. The axles for the 93 that the specialist gave me don't fit. Which leads me to believe that I have a 1.8 drivetrain upgrade. I just bought the car and it was already boosted and I'm guessing it had the rear end swapped.

Check http://www.solomiata.com/Drivetrain.html for good info on differences between the drive train configurations.

A picture of the differential itself would help, but my guess (from your pictures) would be that you do indeed have a '94 or later diff, and '94-'96 axles.

Within the '90-'93 range, all CV axles were interchangeable apart from the ABS sensor rings. The differentials themselves used different stub axles depending on whether they used an open diff or a viscous LSD, however they all mated to the same CV axles.

If I'm not mistaken, it appears that the new axle which you have received is physically longer than the one you pulled off the car, and this would also suggest that the car already has a 1.8-style diff in it. The 1.8 diffs are physically wider than the 1.6 diffs, and so the 1.8 axles are shorter to compensate for this.

Sorry to dig up this zombie but I have a question and can't for the life of me find an answer to and it does kind of go along with what's discussed here.

I had to replace my 92 VLSD for a 94 torsen and I was in a big hurry to get back to the track (club fun day and I had plenty of tires to punish).
My car has ABS but the 94 axles didn't have tone rings.

Can I swap out the outer CV axles and or the whole CV joints ?

You should be able to knock the rings off the old axles and onto the new ones.

That's even easier and much cleaner.
Thank you, I'll give it a whirl.

Well, I tried moving the tone rings from axle to axle and found out that it's a no go in my case.
I replaced my VLSD and ABS acles with a Torsen out of my 94 with the 2 piece axles (no ABS).

Pulled the outside CV joints off both axles and started measuring.
While the axle tubes are of a different length (the 1.6 axle tubes are longer due to the smaller pumpkin), the splines ate identical as in the tube diameter.
The cage and balls from the CV's are also identical as are the boots.
The differences started on the outside of the stub axles, where the tone ring resides.
The ABS stub axles have an extra shoulder machined into them for the tone ring, the non ABS stub axles had that area rounded off. It might be possible to machine the shoulder into the axle but I don't have the equipment so I just did a straight swap.

Anyway, took some pictures for future reference.

The 1.6 and 1.8 axles
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1397082910

From left to right.
1.6 stub axle with tone ring, 1.6 with tone ring removed, 1.8 non ABS
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1397082910
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1397082910


Since it looks like all the CVjoints are the same, I'll be on the lookout for some axles out of an automatic. Non molested spares of OEM quality are always good to have sitting on the shelf.

I always thought the outer CV couldn't be disassembled and reassembled without special equipment. Were you able to accomplish this with ordinary tools? Tutorial?

Advanced Autoparts now sells brand new, not re-manned, 99+ ABS axles for $80 a side. They will fit any car with a 94+ diff. I have one sitting in a box the with the axle nut and socket for the axle nut in the kit of spares for when I blow out an axle at the launch.

Fo-realz?

The axles which came with my 1.8 torsen are bit crusty and for 160 bucks, why not!

-Zach

No shit, I paid treasure coast $90/axle for used ones because I hadn't discovered these yet. No one knows about them yet really. But I want everyone to know so everyone buys them so they ramp production way up.

Good to know- I've never had an ABS car, and this is something I've been curious about. Interestingly, the late NAs (the ones with one-piece axles)) used the same axles for both ABS and non-ABS cars. I'd always assumed that this tradition carried on with the NB- never realized that they went back to segregating them.

Wow, thanks for that, just in time. My Torsen came without axles.

Just ordered them bitches.

$135.98 shipped to my door with this month's discount code.

Yeah, I'm surprised that leaving the machining off saves enough money to be worth stocking two sets of parts in the inventory system, but apparently so. It's true for most of the ABS-related parts -- the ABS and non-ABS uprights are the same casting, but not machined for the sensors on the non-ABS ones. The A-arms are the same stamped/welded pieces, but there are extra brackets on the ABS ones. The non-ABS front hubs do all appear to have been machined to accept the ABS rings, though.

--Ian

I know that the msm diff only takes msm axles. I have not yet checked other torsen axles for nbs to see if it would fit. I have the stub still of my broken msm diff for comparison.

Yes, the MSM diff uses larger axles than the rest of the 94-05 miatas.

Leafy, even the other torsens? Well I figured that explained why it was semi difficult to find one.

Correct. All 94-05 are the same, torsen or otherwise, except for the MSM that uses the larger inner spline (same as the s2k), and larger shaft.

You mean the axle tubes, right ?
Does that mean that the 2 piece axles are the same length as the one piece items ?

Not sure what you mean by "axle tube."

The important difference between an MSM axle and a non-MSM NB axle, for our purposes, is that the section circled in red below is larger in diameter on the MSM axle, as is the opening in the differential which receives it.

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...1&d=1397185152

Thus, an MSM axle will not fit into a non-MSM diff, while trying to insert a non-MSM axle into an MSM
diff is like tossing a hot dog down a hallway.


Yes, the two-piece '94-'95 axles are the same length overall as the one-piece '95.5-'05 axles.

And, for uber-clarity, can be interchanged.

I meant the actual shaft. No CVJoints, no stub axles, nothing.
Right now I know for a fact that the 1.6 shafts are longer than the 1.8's but all joints interchange.

Have no intentions of swapping to one piece setups as I am up to my eyeballs in 1.6 parts but it's nice to know that the local autoparts barn has replacements cheap.

I love you.

They're 136 shipped with their 15% (d43) coupon and free shipping.

Give this mothertrucker a million props.

<p>Slight necro, is advanced auto still the best place to get replacement axles?</p>

I just checked and yeah they are still $80. Then 35% off with WD521 coupon from retailmenot.com and you're looking at $110 for 2 axles or $52 for one.

Holy shit thats awesome.

<p>Advanced Auto Parts is out of stock in warehouse and stores :(</p>

I got a '99 axle at O'Reilly's Monday. The keep them at their warehouse, 1 day to the local store. You can probably order one off their web-site, if they don't have stores local, but the core charge is $70.

1 piece? How much? Think I could use my siexed in the hub axle as a core lol?

Let me look that up for you:
CV Half Shaft / Axle Shaft - 1999 Mazda Miata | O'Reilly Auto Parts

<p>Thank you</p><p><img src="http://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.miataturbo.net-vbulletin/1026x770/80-147272633_4x3_5months_spoonlandings1_b01f738d82b32 e9427fc87cb4bd7f773cfb9ed18.jpg" title="" /><br /><br />&nbsp;</p>

I will warn you guys about Advance's Axles (and hell AutoZones, too), they were complete shit for me on the cars before my Miata days. Granted they were all FWD. But they were all at normal ride heights (no "hella slammed yo" Civics). And 85% of the driving was daily, normal driving. One set the boots ripped in about 4k miles, the next set "clunked" and had play within 15k miles, and the third and final set didn't fit the axle seal perfectly and always leaked. and ALL three sets were out of balance, which caused shaking at highway speed. I sourced a used OEM set with low miles for around $100 and bought them, never had issues for another 50k until I sold the car.

After all the time/money I spent on those cheap Chinese axles, I wish I had just paid $150-$200 a piece for an OEM unit from the get go that would last 150k.

Dealership Mazda axles are Mexican rebuilds.

Advanced Auto are advertised as new axles not re-builds. probably cheap ones. Curious if they are better or worse than stock.

Orielly, Autozone, and Napa are all re-bulds. I can say If They want my Cores back there aint a single part on them that should be re-used. About the only thing left that isn't obviously shit is the center shaft section that is if it hasn't twisted off yet after a year of use in my car. Like rebuilt calipers it’s probably a bit hit and miss as to the severity of their prior life.

I’m pretty sure ones from Mazda are also re-builds. Probably from the same places as the others. I know Mazda doesn’t sell new calipers they are all re-builds.

Bob what axles do you run?
<br />Is there anywhere to get new 2 piece axles?

I've been using 1 piece 95 + salvage yard axles. Within a year of use the balls are imbedded into the cups and races and there are surface cracks where the high contact pressure is and they start developing a lot of slop with a significant on center detent. I’ve been just replacing them often.

With changes I made this year for focused autocross I have a bit more torque and I think the gearing changes with a 4.778 rear and the Quaife transmission followed by a few pro-solos with drag race launches on high grip concrete I’ve upped the loading on them quite a bit. I have now twisted one of the shafts in two. ~340 ft-lbs of torque at between 4500 to 6500 rpm.

Not sure I want to upgrade to $800+ dollar options designed to meet the torque level I’m putting through them as the axles seem to be a good point to keep a fusable link in the system. They are relatively cheap and very easy to replace.

I know the MSM have a bigger shaft and bigger internal spline. Do they have beefier inner CV joints as well, I swear I heard something about that maybe a different type of CV or something.

Reviving an old thread:

Leafy, did you ever figure out whether the CV internals on the MSM axles were different than standard axles?

Or, if anyone wants to chime in.

I am thinking of just going to a driveline shop and see if they can source CV bearings to match the MSM, maybe with better strength.

Apologies for the thread revival and lack of an introduction post. I'm trying like mad to get my recently acquired '94 NA Eunos turbo ready for its first trackday in 2 weeks time. I'll get an introduction and build thread started once I'm not spending all my spare time on the car.

Since I decided I needed to replace all hubs and bearings, I thought I may as well replace all the uprights with NA ABS ones. As part of this swap, I bought some ABS halfshafts for my non ABS NA from a breakers and the 2 driveshafts that arrived are different lengths! I searched for this but couldn't find any results. I've attached a picture. Could someone please shed some light on this?

Is it because one of them is compressed slightly and the other is stretched out? There's 1-2in of travel in CVs.

Doh! Yes it was that! And the award to the most noobish first post ever goes to....! I thought the travel was taken up in the spline for some reason. Thank you!