[jkstill]

You may be tempted to slide the diff into the case with the bearing race and spacer installed on one side, and once the diff is in place install the spacer on the other side.

That won't work, at least in my experience.

I spent several minutes trying to do that. There's just no way to get the spacer in there without damaging the bearing, at least I couldn't do it.

Attempts to do so lead to the edge of 3 of the roller bearings digging a small gouge into the bearing race.

Yeah, ouch.

Fortunately I wasn't really trying to force it all that much - the bearings are pretty hard and it didn't take much to cause the gouges. The bearings themselves were fine. The little ridge on the edge of the gouge sanded out with some 400 grit wet/dry sandpaper.

Attempts to really force it (like whacking it hard with the hammer) would have destroyed the bearing I think.

To install that diff into the case, you need to put the outer races onto the bearings, and the spacers need to be held in place as you slide the diff into the case.

It's kind of tricky at first, but a couple of attempts and you will get the hang of it.

The diff of course will not actually 'slide' all the way in. It must be 'encouraged' with the dead blow hammer. After you get the front edge of the diff in place, you can hold on to it with one hand and tap it in a bit using the dead blow hammer.

After it is in far enough to stay put without any help from you, you can then use the dead blow hammer and some tool to tap the diff and the spacers. Once the spacers were in far enough I used a rounded off chisel to tap the spacers on the front through the axle openings, and a dead blow hammer directly on the diff. Don't hit it too hard though. I don't know if the diff can be damaged by hitting it with the dead blow hammer, but I really didn't want to find out.

Sorry, no pics of this as my hands were full - I should have got someone to take pics while I did this.

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