2011 5.0 Driveshaft failure pics

[AJ]

IPS sent me a new camaro with a drive shaft that failed. GM covered it without question.

[BradyPPC]

did that pull the pinion bolt out?

 

No it basically just twisted and when it twisted, it shortened the front half of the shaft which caused the carrier bearing assembly to seperate. I dont know if you can tell from the pictures but everything was pulled forward slightly.

 

Oops. Looks like this would be one of the first mods for me if I ever get one. There are rumors out there that the one piece shafts make a little bit more rwhp. Are you planning on hitting the dyno to confirm or deny this? I'm curious if these claims are valid.

 

I would imagine that there would be a little gain from there being less driveline loss through the carrier bearing and the fact that the 1 piece aluminum shafts are roughly half the weight of the stock 2 piece unit. I too like to see the changes so as soon as I get a chance, I will throw it back up on the rollers and see where it is compared to the last time it was on there.

 

Prior to the last track day, I made a set of cat delete pipes and did no changes to the tune at all. The car actually dropped power from 2k-4k but picked up 8hp peak. A pretty good trade off actually as at the track, the car is never below 5k. I then added a Steeda cai and the corrected for a/f only. The cai picked up 3hp and 1 lb-ft over the stock airbox. Not much of a gain for the money. With the two combined mods, the car was trapping around 117.5 where previously the highest trap speed I had seen was 114.85.

 

I'd warrantee it. It's a weak link in the car. Ford is likely collecting data on failures of the car, and this is a change that needs to be made in the 2012 5.0.

 

I am sure Ford is monitoring failures however I doubt they will change the driveshaft before 2012. I could be wrong though. The primary reason for the 2 piece driveshaft is noise and vibration reduction. Everything is a compromise and the 2 piece driveshaft is exactly that. The GT500's even come with a 2 piece driveshaft for the same reason. For 90-95% of vehicle owners out there, the stock driveshaft would be fine. If my car had stock suspension and was not running drag radials, the stock unit would still be in one piece. I will probably get flamed for saying this but why should Ford cover me beating the living day lights out of this car or any one else doing it to their car? In my opinion, the twisted/snapped driveshaft falls strictly under the category of "abuse" and should not be considered a Ford problem. I think what a lot of people dont realise is that every time Ford warranties a non warranty item, the cost of that gets put into the next model year and so on. In the short term, the individual doesnt have to pay for it but in the long term we all pay for it with higher prices on domestic products and with manufacturers making it harder and harder for for the vehicles to get modded. This year the diesel trucks got encrypted pcm's. Wonder why? Cause people were modding the snot out of them and then when parts failed, they wanted Ford to warranty it. In the end Ford needs to be profitable and people need to be responsible for what they do with their vehicles. Yeah the driveshaft is a weak link, so what. I knew the car was going to have some when I bought it and I knew that more than likely I was going to find a few and have to foot the bill to put better parts in the car. Its the nature of the game.

 

The stock DS weighs about 43lbs. A 1 piece alum is about 18-20lbs

 

I think you are pretty much dead on with those values.

[BradyPPC]

The new driveshaft is in the car. I am still waiting on the safety loop for it though.

 

http://i548.photobucket.com/albums/ii353/brady/Ford/Mustang/2011%20Mustang/Brady%202011%20GT/DSC00408.jpg

[DTA09]

after a little cruzing tonight ,looks like i may be going this route as well,, not sure of the damage yet , was dark and just wanted to get car loaded and off the road. what ever it was it didnt sound good at all .good luck with yours, though it looks like you have it all under control

[BradyPPC]

after a little cruzing tonight ,looks like i may be going this route as well,, not sure of the damage yet , was dark and just wanted to get car loaded and off the road. what ever it was it didnt sound good at all .good luck with yours, though it looks like you have it all under control

 

That sucks. Let me know if you need any help with anything.

[DTA09]

thanks will do ,, hopefully a new shaft isnt 800 for my car though but from what i COULD see it may be a little more then just the drive shaft.

[pontiacfreak142]

this is why i love owning and fbody, the V6 cars all came with 2 piece drive shafts, but the V8 cars had 1 piece. I picked one up for 20 bucks lol. As for the 1 piece showing more power, it doesnt show more power as much as it does torque. When i switched over to a 1 piece, it showed a gain of roughly 10 ftlb.

[Nitrousbird]

Is there a logical reason as to why Ford put a two piece in the car from the factory?

 

To me, it seems it would be:

- More costly to make

- Weaker

- Heavier

- More likely to have service issues in the future

 

Where is the benefit to it?

[DKilbourne]

Is there a logical reason as to why Ford put a two piece in the car from the factory?

 

To me, it seems it would be:

- More costly to make

- Weaker

- Heavier

- More likely to have service issues in the future

 

Where is the benefit to it?

 

Didn't GM make a two piece for the GTO? I agree with all of the above, but I'd venture to guess that it helped to limit vibration.

[BradyPPC]

Is there a logical reason as to why Ford put a two piece in the car from the factory?

 

To me, it seems it would be:

- More costly to make

- Weaker

- Heavier

- More likely to have service issues in the future

 

Where is the benefit to it?

 

From what I understand, it was to eliminate the chance of vibration in the car. It was a compromise for ride comfort rather than power output.

[Dammit Charlie]

Is there a logical reason as to why Ford put a two piece in the car from the factory?

 

To me, it seems it would be:

- More costly to make

- Weaker

- Heavier

- More likely to have service issues in the future

 

Where is the benefit to it?

 

From what I understand, it was to eliminate the chance of vibration in the car. It was a compromise for ride comfort rather than power output.

 

^ Exactly. Not sure if you mentioned it, but how many track passes were on the old drive shaft?

[BradyPPC]

^ Exactly. Not sure if you mentioned it, but how many track passes were on the old drive shaft?

 

There was a decent amount on it. I would say in the ballpark of 50 or so. Most on street tires. There were probably only a good 8-10 really hard launches on the drag radials.