Update: I looked at the pinion and how it was seated in the race and the darn thing was hung up on the bottom (yoke hanging down) by a shim (?) between the oil seal and the front bearing! The pinion threads were hanging the pinion up off the setup bearing by just a hair, that would explain the slightly rough turning of the pinion that I felt. After figuring that out (I popped the oil seal off and ditched the old bearing and some shim looking thing on top of the small bearing by the yoke) the pinion sat down and spun like a skateboard wheel. I placed the pushrod across the carrier and measured but I could not get a repeatable measurement due to the round nature of the pushrod and the swinging angle of the caliper depth probe. I needed a square beam across so I could get a 90 degree reference for the caliper to pinion measurement. I found a perfect fit from half of a tube flaring press. Its .550 square, straight, flat and fit between the caps. With this setup I measured the bare pinion (without any shims) to be 2.787 deep repeatably. So now I am confident that I only need a .020 shim under the pinion to bring it up to the spec'd 2.767 scribed on the pinion face. Makes much more sense than the old 2.607 measurement that I got when it was not fully seated in the race. First pic is 'spanner' over caps to provide a centerline reference, second pic is bonus of using a square stock over a pushrod as you can get a 90 degree reference for your caliper so you
