Yes, you need to use your companion flange that connects your propeller shaft to the rear diff. AP1 uses 8 mm bolts and AP2 uses 10 mm bolts

The flange is the large round part at the base of the pinion

to the left next to the stub axels

 

Just thought I'd share my own "chunky" diff pics



(the thrust washer and bearing are pretty much NOT coming off the pinion)
Diagnosis was improperly shimmed pinion.
Diff was rebuilt by dealer under 30k miles ago.

 

Are you saying that from the factory the shim was not right?
The dealer rebuilt it 30k ago and it is now broke?.....Wow

Do your self and your rear rebuild a favor and buy new bearings. The ones in the damaged rear are not good to use because of all the metal that was let loose from the pinion gear.
You will need to wash out the LSD real good....REAL GOOD!!! with the amount of damage to the pinion there is debris for sure in the LSD there may even be damage there too. After cleaning it out dump a little motor oil in it to allow it to move free, then insert your stub axels back in with the snap rings removed. Turn the LSD

 

Thanks, it's actually all back together with the 4.57's from Rick's (and all the bearings and such and a new thrust washer).

The shop did their best to wash out, inspect and test the LSD and it APPEARS to be in good working order. I got two heat cycles on the gears before the slave cylinder failed...

From the time the thing started making noise until the time it got REALLY loud I put maybe 50 miles on the car... Once it got really bad (the big teeth go boom) there was less than a mile put on the car.

The dealer rebuilt it about 28k miles ago, at which point they replaced all seals, bearings, and the LSD itself. I brought it back a couple of weeks later for noise and they reshimmed the pinion.

If I'd known that the problem was the diff and not the transmission, as a Honda dealer told me (supposedly after putting it on a lift and listening for the problem when it was still pretty quiet), the car would have been at the dealer that first did the work... They messed up a lot during that rebuild (including my suspension falling apart while I was driving because they forgot to put the retaining pin in a castle nut), the handbrake sticking, all but one of the bolts on the diff flange having to be cut off due to over-torquing, a cut CV boot spraying grease everywhere, um... Yeah...

 

Thanks puddy.
LOL anime, you just have some bad luck with dealers. They are very limited with their S2k knowledge around here.

 

Tell me about it

At least the rest of the diff was intact. No broken caps, bearings, etc... Even the ring was pretty much intact. Pretty much, but not something I would want to reuse.

 

haha, precision gearing needs perfection practically.

 

Well boys after my car sat in the driveway for a month on jackstands I finally got her all back together. J's 2 way made some hideous sound pulling out of the driveway, I'm guessing because it hadn't circulated oil into all the nooks yet. Drove it to my buddies house, about 12 miles and it practically makes no noise whatsoever, not even a whine like the stock diff. I ended up getting an 05 housing, J's LSD and J's 4.7 final drive, and a distance collar. We set the backlash at .004" and torqued it down, rechecked it. Checked the tooth contact, which looked pretty darn close so we left it. I must say putting a diff together with the distance collar was stupid easy. I would have like to have a ever so slightly thicker shim behind the pinion gear to make the tooth contact perfect but it was so close my uncle said it would be fine. Like I said it makes no noise at all, it only clunked like once/twice, we went to a parking lot and it still was noise free. I put Trans-x LSD additive in with some 85W140, so thats a pretty good recipe if anyone needs to know. I will be going to a cusco fluid after break in. Its pretty expensive, $36 a liter.

 

It started whining today after my first full blown hard pull, I'm gonna drop the driveshaft and check the torque on the coupler nut on the back of the pinion gear. I didn't buy a new nut, if its loose I'm gonna lock tite it. If the problem is still there I'll have to tear it back down..... which would really suck. I've put about 300miles on her so far, hoping the nut is the only problem. Whine only happens during deceleration. Anybody else think my hypothesis is right?

 

idk...my 4.57's whine only under light accel and right at 49-51mph everywhere else they are ok, but I hear thats normal with 4.57's