Drive shaft Issues

[Special K]

I had my car up on stands to replace the guibo when I found all sorts of fun stuff. The previous owner had replaced the transmission and did about the worst job anyone could do. One of the mounting tabs for the transmission is completely broken off and he tried to make his own mounts out of this really gummy rubber. No good. The guibo was installed with 5 bolts of different kinds (instead of 6) and 4 nuts. (On the positive side it was easy to change because the rest of the nuts were already loose!) The CSB was completely destroyed and he GLUED it back together! By the way, part of the negotiation of the sale was for him to replace the CSB, which he obviously did not do. Not to mention all the shields and bolts that I removed to get at the driveline were all finger tight.

My questions are:
-How do I post pictures on here?
-How do I secure the transmission with a broken mount?
-Should I get a new CSB or a new/rebuilt driveshaft? I have no idea how to tell if the u-joints are good
-Are there any other areas that would be affected by the p.o.s P.O. driving the car like this for a long time? Diff mounts? Subframe mounts?

[jlevie]

Should I get a new CSB or a new/rebuilt driveshaft?

A failure of the CSB is almost always the result of binding u-joints in the drive shaft. Replacing just the CSB may gain temporary relief, but the news CSB will have a short life. The only long term fix is to replace both the CSB and drive shaft.

-How do I secure the transmission with a broken mount?

The only fix for this is to replace the transmission. While a broken tab can be welded back on, that presumes having the piece that broke off (which I doubt that you do).

[Special K]

New question:
The u-joints dont have any slop when I twist them (twisting one direction on one side of the joint and twisting the other direction on the other side) and they move freely with no binding. Am I checking these correctly or is there some other way to test them?
Is it a possibility that the bad trans mounts and broken trans mount tab is causing the CSB and guibo to fail? And if this were the case could I still use the same driveshaft? BTW I can grab the back of the trasmission and move it about an 1 1/2 in any direction.

[jlevie]

It is possible that the broken transmission mount is the cause of the CSB failure.

[Special K]

Am I testing the U-joints correctly??

[jlevie]

Yes, but I have to say that unless you've had your hands on a new drive shaft for comparison, what could feel like free may not really be.