RE: [ihc] Why would you want a D70?

["Mac @ TRIAD" <mac@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

## >> >my question would be why would someone want a D70 instead of
## >> the IH axle?
## >>
## >> Parts availability?
## >> Matching ratios with a D70 at the other end of the truck for a 4x4
## >> application?

i meant at the time of ordering the truck.  nowadays the parts availability
issue is a big one.  but back when these were new, parts were available for
both.  so my question is for the people who bought them new back then.  why
a D70 versus an IH corporate axle.  i'd have chosen the IH axle, but i'm
weird, so my reasoning probably doesn't apply to anybody else.

## >> Now that I mentioned parts availability (someone in the 100's
## >> of RA-nn posts
## >> mentioned that IH parts were not available), if these axles
## >> were licensed
## >> from Rockwell, do Rockwell parts fit the IH axles?  Are parts any more
## >> available for the Rockwell axles?

i know there are at least *some* fairly minor differences.  what those
differences are, i have never been able to determine, but probably bearings,
bolt patterns, dunno what else.  when i made the axle swap on my B in 1990,
the drums for the new axle, which are larger than the 14" drums from the
RA15, were still available from a local heavy parts distributor, Kroeker, in
fresno.  they are no longer available.  i did not ask at the time who the
drums were made by, but my suspicion is that they were Rockwell drums.
Kroeker dealt in a LOT of Rockwell hardware.

it's funny...  at the time i was looking for drum availability for my new
axle, i went to Kroeker...  and oh boy was i pissed off.  they had a
hand-built trailer on their showroom floor with a pair of gutted RA15 axles
and brand spanking new drums on it in the 6-lug i needed for my old axle.
NOT FOR SALE, they told me.  but you could rent the trailer.  i don't know
what happened to it.

--Mac

P.S.:  up in the mountains north of Fresno/Clovis, there's a small service
station on 168 East, going up towards Shaver Lake.  out front is a very odd
snow truck.  it's got a cab from a very old pickup truck, something from the
'40s, with a hand-built sheetmetal cowl and a flatbed.  it's powered by a
Chevy 283 with a 2-speed powerglide tranny.  the really odd part is that
it's sitting on a tracked conversion, and the axles appear to be IH
Corporates.  both axles were steering axles, you can see the flanges where
the knuckles bolted on.  they took those knuckles off and bolted these track
contraptions on the flanges instead.  the front axle pivots directly above
the pumpkin and that's how it steers.  it was pretty neat to look at, and i
bet it works great in the snow.

---------------------------------------------------------------
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Krystof "Mac" MacBryghde
TyrGothi

http://master.triad.ath.cx/