Driveshaft removal:
Had a horrible time getting the drive shafts out. It obviously had been done before.
Between the rust+slightly rounded corners+old threadlocking compound, 3 of the 4 bolts for the rear yoke of the front shaft wouldn't come out with a 12 point wrench.
hmmm... 12 point wrench slips... not enough room for a 6 point socket and ratchet....

After screwing around with trying metric and SAE wrenches, and various other ideas..
I ended up using one of those 1/4" socket drive bits designed for screwdrivers.
I stuck it in the socket, and ground down the length of the bit, until the two fit on the bolt on the driveshaft yoke. I simply used a 1/4" wrench to turn the bit and that got the bolts loose.

Crossmember:
I used a mini sledgehammer to move the passenger side of the crossmember backwards and the driver's side forwards, so i could remove it (after removing the nuts/bolts the secure it to the frame. Since the truck is a 4x4 you can't simply drop it straight down, because the torsion bars are below the crossmember. fuel lines on the framerail also impede dropping it straight down too.


Cheers !

 

It's out !!

Pulling the engine and transission:
With the crossmember and transfercase out, I hooked up the engine crane and leveling bar, then pulled the front motor mounts (while the transmission was supported). Once the crane was holding all the weight, i removed the jack from under the transmission and proceeded to lift the engine and transmission as a unit.

Only issue i had was due to the length of the levelng bar and maximum height of the engine crane.

The bar wasn't able to tilt the engine enough (a longer bar would have helped), but 2 of us were able to help manually tilt the engine enough to get the crank to clear the radiator mount. The second problem was getting the engine high enough to have the transmission clear the firewall so i could tilt the whole thing level.

The crane just couldn't get that extra inche so we had to manually assist the crane. Even then, the oil pan had to drag across the lip of the radiator mount.
If the levelling bar was 3" longer and the crane 3" higher.. then it would have nice and easy.

This isn't good for when I put the shiny engine in the shiny engine bay.
Especially since the truck it is going in, has a 3" body lft.
I figure I will have to hoist the engine then remove the front wheels and lower the truck so that the crane will lift high enough. That would also help with the angle problem. I'm also going to shorten the chain between the crane boom and the leveling bar.

So, yes it can be done on the early pre-v8 style dakota 4x4.... with the correct crane and levelling bar....

Now i just need to figure out what fun stuff i can do to the 3.9 engine to improve it's performance. I figure headers are probably too much of a tight fit on the 4x4. Maybe a performance chip, some head work, and bigger throttle body ? time to do more info hunting....

Cheers !

 

I never use 12 point sockets. It's always recommended to use standard sockets to stop you stripping bolts.

 

Hi lo 619 !

oh so true...

I totally agree. in fact, i found a passthrough socket set that I avoided buying simply because it was a "universal" type that could also fit splined type bolts. (it was nice otherwise)

In this case I was using top quality 12 point wrenches. They fit nice and tight normally but whoever did it previously damaged the bolts and in those cases it would be a crap shoot with them. I phoned some friends to see if they had 6 point wrenches but in the end had to make do with the socket+modified bit adapter

Which bring to mind a question...
Anyone know of a wrench design that can grip damaged bolt heads in tight spaces ?
I've seen sockets that supposedly work for that....

Cheers !