Though I've never had my Tigers rear axle apart, I have serviced a lot of
other rear ends & they are all pretty much the same. If you have looseness
in the pinion you almost certainly have worn bearings. Atempts to remove the
play by shimming without replacing the bearing are not likely to be
successful and might cause damage to parts that are now ok. Often the
bearings that make noise or run rough under load look pretty good to the
untrained eye. My suggestion would be to replace the 2 pinion bearings & 2
side carrier bearings. In the great majority of cases you do not have to
adjust shims, bearings are very precisely made. I would do a gear tooth
contact pattern check & if it looks good button up the axle & run it. Many
repair manuals will give illustrations of gear tooth contact patterns. in
general the teeth should contact near the center of the tooth on both drive
& coast sides.
Good luck
Doug Leithauser
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