So my driveshaft is bad....

[Natty]

I took my car in to have the mystery shimmy looked at. It turns out my drive shaft joints are going bad. I have a quote for $650 which includes a new drvieshaft (the whole damn thing!) and labor. My S13 has 156,000 miles on it.

I may try and get a used driveshaft from a junker for $100.
Any of these prices seem right? Which route should I go?
Jeff

[Dousan_PG]

650!! GOOD LORD. you can get a carbon fibre on or a bit more. i think a one piece DS runs that much

go junkyard or post some people have parts lying around or junk s13s/14s!

DO IT YOURSELF and save a grip!

[brage]

Replacing the drive shaft should not be hard!!

-jeff

[ATL S13]

Enjuku sells a one piece drive shaft for the S13.. it is made out of aluminum.. cost is $430.

[West]

Originally posted by ATL S13
Enjuku sells a one piece drive shaft for the S13.. it is made out of aluminum.. cost is $430.

They have any info on it. I saw it on their car in the profiles section and though I emailed them about it but never heard back from them about it. If you have any info or know where I can get some please let me know. Thanks!

[ATL S13]

Go to www.enjukuracing.com

Make --> Nissan
Model --> SR20DET
Differential

And you will see it.

[DarkRaptor42]

has anyone bought the enjuku drive shaft and had any results with it? I Can imagine a huge power gain over the ****ty stock drive shaft but the reason I never made a move to get that (my drive shaft needs a replacing too) is cause Id never heard anything about it.

[gfisch]

Hey, ive got the front half of the driveshaft leftover from my wrecked '95.
I think it should be the same, right???
Email me if you want it.

[MasterOFDrift]

you should buy a one piece drive shaft maybe enjuku and install it yourself it isn't hard at all. Its not even semi worth paying that mechanic 650 !

[Natty]

Thanks guys! So the install isn't that hard? Maybe I will give it a go. If I can pull it off a junker okay, then I should be able to do it.
I'll look into a one piece too. What kind of gains would I be getting?
Jeff

[DarkRaptor42]

dont get one from a junkyard, odds are it will be worse off then the one you have and will need to be balanced if your worried about the ride. Just spend the cash and get it fixed or buy the one from enjuku, thats what I would do. And as far as installing it goes, its about the easiest thing you can do engine/transmission related. Its just four bolts or so. And the gains you could expect would be great.
think of it like this, the HP rating for the car is cut down buy about 20% after the crank because it has to go through the drive shaft. Well that 20% comes from the parasitic wieght of the drive shaft. illminate the wieght and you get HP back. Its why front wheel drive cars were invented. You eliminate the drive shaft and you get more power in one spot and less wasted energy.

[nrcooled]

I just took my drive shaft off to get the tranny off. Super easy. If you have wrenches and an IQ a little higher than a monkey you'll be set:D j/k. But it is really easy

[drift freaq]

Hey, ive got the front half of the driveshaft leftover from my wrecked '95.
I think it should be the same, right???

nope, the S14 driveshafts have the support bush on the front part of the driveshaft and the S13 has it on the rear.
FWIW; there are several driveshaft shops here in socal that can make you a aluminum single piece driveshaft.
In fact any driveshaft shop worth a damn can do it. Driveshaft shops are all over the country i.e. around any major city.
It should not be hard for any of you to look in your local phone books and find this info .

[West]

How much does the stock s13 Driveshaft weigh?

[ItzGenX]

You could always go for the carbonfiber driveshaft if you wanted it to last. It has perfect elastic memory, meaning when the driveshaft twists, it will automatically go back to how it was, giving the joints longer life and less of a beating. Iron, steel, and aluminum driveshafts will eventually get stuck in the twisted position causing bearings, joints, and other things to go bad because of the misalignment of the two ends being offset over time.

[DarkRaptor42]

where can you get a CF drive shaft though?

[Steeles]

there is actually a farily decent article in Super street (i know I didnt believe it either) on drivetrains with a good write up about driveshafts and the differences in materials and benefits.

[Gunburn]

LOL I just ask the carbon fiber driveshaft thing in another post but here is a link I got out of it.

http://www.pstds.com/critical-link.cfm

[drift freaq]

How much does the stock s13 Driveshaft weigh?


roughly around 25lbs. Robthechef got a aluminum driveshaft made for his Turbo Ka S14 and it dropped about 10-15lbs. He never would admit how much it cost him.
I am guessing somewhere in the neighborhood of $400.
Just going to a straight one piece steel driveshaft helps in the HP loss through drivetrain equation.
Reason being with the center support bushing and extra u joints you lose torque transfer causeing HP loss.
The reason the factory builds our driveshafts in two pieces is two fold. First is the fact that they use non replaceable U joints . Read: cheap to purchase because they cost a lot less to manufacture i.e. production line costs savings.
Ok because of this the engineers realized that if they cocked the angle of the driveshaft slightly to the U joints it would cut down on wear on the U joints. Thereby extending the life of the U joint much longer, making the whole concept of u joint replacement for the average car owner unknown and never needed. It is rare to see Nissans replacing driveshafts due to bad U joints.
Second was the center support bush technically also makes for less driveline vibration. This is the same idea behind our dreaded clutch dampners , which are installed to eliminate clutch pedal vibration when your revs are up.
Nissan loves to do things to try and make the ride more comfortable. In fact they are right up there with Toyota in that department.
(Gotta love those Camry's with the phase cancellation sound setups to eliminate exterior road noise. They really work!)
Ok on to the arguement the driveshaft shop will give you when you ask them to make a single piece driveshaft. I have run into this one
:rolleyes: "you do not have any angle on your u joint so it will wear prematurely"
The laugh about this is go back and look at 510's and 240Z's their driveshafts are either almost as long or as long as ours and they are single piece with replaceable U joints.
Man its funny how manufactures can do cost saving comforts mods to a standard idea and convince people the standard age old concept is bad.
Truth is yes angling your driveshaft slightly will cut down on U joint wear due to not spinning the joint directly on load bearing wise.
Fact is U joints are cheap . Not to hard to have replaced and are lubable which means greasing them will help.
Average replaceable u joints life on single piece driveshafts is upwards of 60-70 thousand miles by my estimate. Hmmm kinda like a clutch job . Lot cheaper though:D
Not a bad trade off in my book . hehehhehehhehe
thats pretty much the whole deal in a nutshell. That link that ruf posted explains why Carbon fiber eliminate all the issues I have outlined . Though you do pay a premium . :eek: :D hehehehhehehhe

[kandyflip445]

I say get a NEW driveshaft and do the install yourself. That way you don't have the chance of gettin another bad driveshaft. You can also learn a little more about repairing your own car.

[xhdriver]

can you PLEASE describe the "mystery shimmy" you are talking about cause i think i might have it and i cant figure out the cause, thanks alot.

[Natty]

Originally posted by xhdriver
can you PLEASE describe the "mystery shimmy" you are talking about cause i think i might have it and i cant figure out the cause, thanks alot.
Oh boy, this will take a while.

I jacked up my car one day and took off the front wheels to inspect my brake pads, which I thought were worn down. I took them out and low and behold, the pads were not worn down. I reassembled and went for a drive. Ever since that drive, I get a shimmy from 40-80. It really only bothers me from 55-70 though.

In truth, I think my mechanic is wrong. Although the driveshaft probably is worn, I doubt it is the cause of the problem.

Where do you come into this? Don't go around trying to replace every last part hoping it is cause for your shimmy. There are over $1500 worth of parts that can cause it, and that is if it's your own labor. Have a pro look at it.

Back to the shimmy. It doesn't change the course of the car, it just massages your hands :p

Good luck with it. I sure had to luck tracking mine down :(
Jeff

[Natty]

So replacing the drive shaft with a new one isn't hard at all? Just bolt on and go?
No balancing, aligning, adjusting, etc?
Seems strange how the mechanic wan't so much for a simple job.
Thanks!
Jeff

[xhdriver]

i have a shake betwee 20 and 15 everytime and it seems like it is right below the center console and i cant figure it out.

[drift freaq]

now that you have described . I think your mechanic is full of *&^&. One replacing a driveshaft is not that expensive . Two that shimmy you described sounds like worn out front suspension components i.e. TC rod bushings, struts and tie rod ends. All those components are capable of causing front end shimmy you would feel in your steering wheel if they went bad.
Your brake rotors being out of round or warped could cause that as well under braking .

[nrcooled]

Originally posted by drift freaq
now that you have described . I think your mechanic is full of *&^&. One replacing a driveshaft is not that expensive . Two that shimmy you described sounds like worn out front suspension components i.e. TC rod bushings, struts and tie rod ends. All those components are capable of causing front end shimmy you would feel in your steering wheel if they went bad.
Your brake rotors being out of round or warped could cause that as well under braking .

I replaced the TC rod in the front end due to bad bushings. That got rid of my shimmy from 55->up. Pretty cheap fix. Do a check up and look for anything that doesn't look right in the suspension.

[ItzGenX]

I used to have a hand massager too! From 50-75mph it would vibrate *vigorously*. In a short story, it was tire balance.

[BuudWeizErr]

I just got done installing my SR, and I made a mistake when I was removing the KA. Right behind the KA tranny, there is a piece that goes into the tranny, and it has 3 bolts connecting it to the rest of the driveshaft. Don't undo those bolts to drop the driveshaft. Instead.... if you are looking underneath the car, along the driveshaft, closest to the tranny, there will be a U bracket and one bolt on each side. Take those bolts out, and the driveshaft will "bend." You should be able to pull it out of the tranny now, and it shouldn't take too much force. If for some reason, you can't get it out, there are four bolts that hold the driveshaft into the differential. You can remove those four bolts and the whole driveshaft will drop down. You will need to do this if you are getting a new driveshaft. If you do this, make sure you don't lose the U brackets. There are actually two. One on the bottom, one on the top, and it actually makes it look more like an O.