oh boy...

[Cleaner Man]

Well, I started out to do spline maintenance on my '97 Standard.  the Guard Dog paste, and grease were both quite hard, and had to be scraped off of the splines (we mixed a little Amsoil gear lube with it- bad idea is my guess).  Fortunately the splines look real good.  The problem is that the drive shaft and pinion were bone dry and very rusty (this area was lubed 6,000 miles ago with our "special mix").  The drive shaft and pinion show about a 25% wear, and will be replaced.  Also- the oil seal seems to have a small gap (1/16 inch?) around the outside of it where it meets the pinion when i move it up and down. It will be replaced too.
Question:  should the oil seal have that gap?  Also- how hard is it to take the pinion gear off of the pumkin?  i archived this subject, and someone said that the dealer will have to do it (special tool needed).  My dealer looks at me cross-eyed when i ask him about these things (thats probably why he has to sell lawn mowers and generators!).
As always- thanks for the great advice on this, and on all the other stuff i read on this site.

[Charlie]

Hey Bro.  I don't know much about this topic, but I do know there are guys on the Michigan Board that do.  I am sure Fuzzy could help you out.  Here is the url for the Michigan Board.

http://forums.mivrcc.com/index.php

Good luck, and let me know if there is anything I can do to help.  I have a trailer for hauliing bikes if need be.  And I am located in Grand Rapids as well.

[Daniel Meyer]

Pinion cup and driveshaft? Not all that hard.

Pinion cup off the pumpkin just needs an air imact wrench. Stick the star in the drive splines, shove a 2x4 or such through the pins, brace yourself, and go for the pinion cup nut with the impact wrench.

Replace the seal. Don't use paste in there...it calls for grease on that end of it...it's an assembly lube and that cup is lubed by rear end oil (there are ports to bring it up and drain it back).

[Cleaner Man]

thanks kindig for your offer to help...I need to ride with you all this summer.  And thanks Daniel for the good advice (and a reason to buy another tool!

[Madmike]

If you don't already have an air compressor don't br afraid to try the 1/2 drive electric impact wrenches.  I have one that I use if I don't want to start a compressor and have used it for changing tires etc and it works quite adequately for this. 

The one that I have has quite a heavy hammer mechanism in it - I would say that the electric 1/2 weighs about the same as my Blue Point 3/4 air impact.