Anybody else have this rear differential??

[RickyD]

I had my car in the shop the other day for a oil change and the shop Manager looked my car up and sure enough it was on the list for the new rear differential seal change so I left it there over night and since it was up on the lift I thought I would take a look at the rear differential since I had purchased the new nylon bushing for it i would take a look and see how hard it was to change. So the Tech and I got under the car and looked and we couldn't figure out where it went?? We went over to another Sky that was up also and looked and something was wrong. My Sky doesn't have any place to put that bushing Instead it had a big torque beam that was bolted to the diff and ran along the drive shaft tunnel all the way up and bolted to the transmission. I just had to figure this out so I got on line and started searching the Opel GT, since they are built in the same plant. As we all know the GT in Europe is only available in the turbo model and guess what!! They all have the torque beam installed. It makes the trany and rear diff along with the hole car a lot stronger that way.
For the Opel GT A manual five-speed transmission with sporty, short gear travel and limited slip differential provide propulsion power. A torque beam between the transmission and rear axle suppresses reactions to acceleration/deceleration effects.
The first picture is what the Sky's have in them. The old style and the new one. I took pictures of the rear diff on the Sky next to mine then of where the bushing would normally go then of the end of the torque beam I am talking about. Does anybody have this rear end? Maybe our cars started out as Opel's and ended up being Sky's

[Kappa Fan]

Originally Posted by RickyD

I had my car in the shop the other day for a oil change and the shop Manager looked my car up and sure enough it was on the list for the new rear differential seal change so I left it there over night and since it was up on the lift I thought I would take a look at the rear differential since I had purchased the new nylon bushing for it i would take a look and see how hard it was to change. So the Tech and I got under the car and looked and we couldn't figure out where it went?? We went over to another Sky that was up also and looked and something was wrong. My Sky doesn't have any place to put that bushing Instead it had a big torque beam that was bolted to the diff and ran along the drive shaft tunnel all the way up and bolted to the transmission. I just had to figure this out so I got on line and started searching the Opel GT, since they are built in the same plant. As we all know the GT in Europe is only available in the turbo model and guess what!! They all have the torque beam installed. It makes the trany and rear diff along with the hole car a lot stronger that way.
For the Opel GT A manual five-speed transmission with sporty, short gear travel and limited slip differential provide propulsion power. A torque beam between the transmission and rear axle suppresses reactions to acceleration/deceleration effects.
The first picture is what the Sky's have in them. The old style and the new one. I took pictures of the rear diff on the Sky next to mine then of where the bushing would normally go then of the end of the torque beam I am talking about. Does anybody have this rear end? Maybe our cars started out as Opel's and ended up being Sky's

That first picture is one I took .... from MY 06 Solstice ... the rear diff is the OLD style and it was replaced with one in the front - the NEW style with the beefed up attachment point (nothing to do with the torque beam).

[RickyD]

I dont have either of these. It doesn't have the mount bushing at all it just bolts to the beam?

[GaryH]

Was the other Sky mine? If I remember right, when our Skys were on the rack next to each other, you mentioned that the rear ends were different.

[RickyD]

Hi Gary. No it wasn't yours I drive mine a lot more then most thats why I have 33,000 miles on mine and I change oil when it gets to around 50% so I probably have been in there twice since the last time I saw you there. This was a red one. Not sure who it belongs to.

[Randy@DDMWorks]

Sometime in early to mid 07 MY on both Solstice and Sky platforms, GM made a running change to the drivetrain. They converted the setup to a torque arm style. When they did this, the forward bushing mount was eliminated. The Original Kappa platform had the single bolt mount. When they started the torque arm set up they changed castings for the rear-end. The new Diff had a 4 bolt mount on the side. The torque arm bolts directly to these points. In order to make this new diff usable as a replacement part to the older Kappas, they changed and made the newer style bracket that mounts to the 4 bolts on the side and includes the bushing to mount to the body.

In other words, if you have the torque arm setup, there is no bushing or need of the bushing. If you have either of the other two styles (single bolt/old or 4 bolt/newer) the bushing is a nice upgrade.

PS, If you need the bushing, we currently have them on sale at DDMWorks

[RickyD]

I now have one for sale