Salisbury differential shot - repair or replace options

Hi All:
I have a hybrid 109/110 that I have operated for 31 years now. I live in north Florida where old Rover expertise is hard to come by. In fact, most of those questions tend to come to me - though I am by no means an expert.
Some years ago I put a late 80's (maybe early 90's) military rear axle in it. It is one with drum brakes and a Salisbury diff. Front diff is usual Rover. LT-77S gearbox and LT-230 transfer case.
After a recent lengthy overland I started getting some diff whine. When I went to inspect it I realized that at least the pinion shaft bearings on the rear diff are shot. There is significant lateral play in the pinion shaft (side to side rather than front to rear). There is front to rear play as well. By "play" I mean a lot. Lateral play is roughly 80 thousandths for we Americans (or about 2mm). I have not pulled the rear cover off but it's pretty sure nothing good will be revealed when I do.
I am used to Series and RR differentials where this is a simple matter of pulling the old one and slapping a new one in. I pulled my service manual and was taken aback by the tooling needed to work on one of these Salisburys. You have to set the diff up in situ in the case, and it looks like you need a lot of specialized tooling to do it. Lots of measurements and shims to get the lateral and longitudinal spacing right.
I understand that axle is basically a Dana Series 60 so it is originally an American design but looks like it was made by GKN and maybe enhanced a bit. I might be able to get some local truck axle places to tackle it, but it is tough when they see a Rover drive up because they have never worked on one before.
I was wondering if there might be a good alternative known in the 110 community. My first preference would be to swap this axle for one that uses an easily replaced diff. A second preference would be to buy an overhauled complete axle assembly with the diff already set up. The third preference would be to tackle this diff replacement job but honestly I would rather not get into trying to properly set up the pinion/crown gear spacing etc.
Help! Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

Ratio is different on the series(leaf sprung) and later coil sprung diffs.

wileycat said:

Hi All:
I have a hybrid 109/110 that I have operated for 31 years now. I live in north Florida where old Rover expertise is hard to come by. In fact, most of those questions tend to come to me - though I am by no means an expert.
Some years ago I put a late 80's (maybe early 90's) military rear axle in it. It is one with drum brakes and a Salisbury diff. Front diff is usual Rover. LT-77S gearbox and LT-230 transfer case.
After a recent lengthy overland I started getting some diff whine. When I went to inspect it I realized that at least the pinion shaft bearings on the rear diff are shot. There is significant lateral play in the pinion shaft (side to side rather than front to rear). There is front to rear play as well. By "play" I mean a lot. Lateral play is roughly 80 thousandths for we Americans (or about 2mm). I have not pulled the rear cover off but it's pretty sure nothing good will be revealed when I do.
I am used to Series and RR differentials where this is a simple matter of pulling the old one and slapping a new one in. I pulled my service manual and was taken aback by the tooling needed to work on one of these Salisburys. You have to set the diff up in situ in the case, and it looks like you need a lot of specialized tooling to do it. Lots of measurements and shims to get the lateral and longitudinal spacing right.
I understand that axle is basically a Dana Series 60 so it is originally an American design but looks like it was made by GKN and maybe enhanced a bit. I might be able to get some local truck axle places to tackle it, but it is tough when they see a Rover drive up because they have never worked on one before.
I was wondering if there might be a good alternative known in the 110 community. My first preference would be to swap this axle for one that uses an easily replaced diff. A second preference would be to buy an overhauled complete axle assembly with the diff already set up. The third preference would be to tackle this diff replacement job but honestly I would rather not get into trying to properly set up the pinion/crown gear spacing etc.
Help! Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

Click to expand...

I forgot to mention - it is a 21S series axle assembly, which I think decodes to Rover Part FTC2352

Any Discovery one's your way ? In the scrap yards. Common change here in UK and you get to have disc brakes on rear as well. If so get the prop as well.

This is the type of suggestion I was hoping for. We should have loads of scrap Discovery I's. They were very popular and I have no doubt I could locate some in the breakers yards. What else do you think I need to know? I can fabricate some brake lines to the calipers. I've got the G valve (brake proportioning valve) for rear drums - Do I need to swap to a different valve for rear discs? Come to think of it I bet every Disco sold here had ABS. Hope that doesn't complicate things.

Also makes me wonder if you can swap the front axle from a Disco I. My front swivel balls are getting pretty tired.