Alright, finally got the 4.77 S2 diff in and locked down, PPF aligned, and thought I was in the homestretch... and then I had to get these darn CV shafts back in and wound up in a special hell I hadn't thought existed.

Got new OEM circlips for these on, lubed everything up, and then struggled HEAVILY trying to get them to go all the way into the differential socket!!


At first the shaft hung out a little over an inch but was threaded onto the splines and could turn the carbon-fiber driveshaft by rotating at the hub... but it simply wouldn't go in any further and no amount of pushing/tugging/twisting would get it to go.

I did a bunch of searches on this and found surprisingly little that didn't involve taking a torch to the clips to reshape them... i decided that was ill-advised as i doubt the OEM ones would require such an insane effort.

Eventually i managed to twist/pry/push until I got the shock and most of the ball-joint pins into socket where they could support the hub, and then with a hockey puck and a rubber mallet, i proceeded to bump the hub at the axle joint... a bit.

After plenty of swiveling/pressing/swearing/bumping and more swiveling... eventually I got it to what seems to be all the way in... (see pictured) but honestly I don't even know if I can trust it.


When I pull back on the green housing it moves about 1/4" and feels like it stops... but that's all I know.

I expected to look into the other open side of the differential and see the ring expanded in that space beyond the splines before the hexagonal post you can see in the middle...but I can't be sure.


Everyone makes this sound a whole lot simpler than it appears to be, can someone bring some help/advice to all of this before I go trying to get the other shaft in...