Report Field trip to Tom Woods

[Rusted]

I went on the coolest field trip today. I called Tom Woods the other day to ask if I could come up and chat, take some photos and make a field trip out of it. He welcomed me right up, and even said he would turn his underwear inside out so it was just like wearing a clean pair again Funny guy...

A few months ago I was in need of a drive line to finish off the 350 swap into my scrambler. So I had to get something a little special for it, just needed to be a little longer than stock, and I had to keep it skinny because of some clearance issues, so I had to have one made. I called around town to some places for some quotes, and then called Tom up. I found that his prices were the same or better than my other phone calls, and I knew he had a good reputation. He pretty much knew exactly what I needed already, but he asked me to print off the instructions from his website, go get some measurements to verify it. It took me a less than 5 minutes to find my tape, measure my yokes, measure my length and call him back. No kidding it was much faster and easier than anything in town I could find. I then told him that I was not in a rush, make it low priority, and get it to me in a week or so. He told me that he treats everything the same, and it would ship the next day :greg: !! A few days later it was delivered, packaged better than expected, wrapped up nice to keep it clean, u-joints included and ready to bolt in. Since then I have never worried about it at all.

So fast forward to today when I showed up at his door to see what this was all about. I half expected a dirty old garage or dark warehouse with Tom and maybe one other guys making a few drivelines a day. But I was very surprised! Tom overwhelmed me with information and cool things to see as I was there I was wishing I had come more prepared. This guy knows everything about 4x4 drivelines.




When I walked in I kind of missed the door to the office in front and saw shelf after shelf of organized parts

 

[Rusted]

Tom was very friendly and welcoming. He immediately invited me into the front office and introduced me to the two employees who work mostly there. You know when you can tell when someone has respect for another person? Well you can tell that Tom has a lot of respect for each of his employees and see the value of each one. Tom Woods has been in business for about 10 years now. I think that nearly every employee had been there for at least 3 years. He treats his crew very well, and in return they treat him well.

His whole company from start to end is set up very organized. Basically each person there has a roll in the process and a place in the assembly line so to speak. I was impressed at how busy the phones were. I literally never saw a moment when one of the three in the office were not talking on the phone, and usually two were talking to customers at a time.

First Tom and I sat down and he showed me some of his new production parts that he has been working on and some of the tools he uses to check their quality and consistency.


This was a tray of yolks and flanges that were ready for inspection. He took the time to tell me about how they have been working on this new design for about a year and a half trying to get them right. Some of them were and older design and the newer designs were made without any stress points and slim lined. The new design also allowed the joint to move 5-10 degrees more than the factory yolks allowed.


Tray sample parts he had out to measure and compare for quality and consistency


A Dial Indicator is used so each part can be measured very accurately to make sure it meets correct tolerances. The distance between the face and the shoulder inside (not show in the photos) is critical to have just right.

 

[Rusted]

From there Tom walked me through the driveline process. When the order is called in very simple notes that every employee can understand and read quickly and accurately are taken. In one short line they write the type of shaft, the diameter, the yokes to install and length. Those notes then travel throughout the process.

The rack full of tube, ready for the next day’s production


I missed the photo, but the tube is cut to the right length, faced moved to the next station.


Here each part is assembled by hand. It was interesting to see that if they need one item assembled they just assemble 20 at the same time. It helps them keep inventory ready, but also means that as they look at 20 at a time the quality is kept higher because any blems or issues will stand out more than if just one was being assembled. (others to compare to)


There are bins and shelfs like this everywhere, all the same parts, all organized.

 

[Rusted]

At the next station the tubes and ends are assembled and welded together.

First they are lined up and pressed with a huge hydraulic press (notice the flexible hose above the table, I show what it is used for in the next post)


Being pressed



Tapped into place and verified that it is perfectly round using the dial indicator. Then welded and retested to make sure the joint is straight


The welder is they put into a holster and lined up ready for the weld.




Then the driveline is turned by hand at the right speed to control the weld perfectly


This guy has done who knows how many thousands of these welds. When it was done it was very consistent, no pauses in the weld, and did not need any clean up. The process was impressive
[YOUTUBE]ygSRf0-zj9M[/YOUTUBE]


The little bubble level was used to make sure the driveline was going to be in perfect phase before the weld. They took a minute or two tweaking and adjusting to make sure it was just right before it was welded. I was amazed at how accurate this who process was, there is literally zero chance of error in the entire process because every step is checked and re-checked.





Other end being welded in the same manner
[YOUTUBE]6dHNmf8KDu8[/YOUTUBE]

Here is what the final welds look like.

 

[Rusted]

This little guy was cool. Tom said that the shop used to get very smoky and nasty from all the welding that was going on. A new hood and vent system was going to be close to $18,000

Then he found this. It looks and acts like a shop vac. The coolest part was it is automatically activated by the welding spark. It just sucks the smoke through the shop vac and is a super air filter to clean the air. Finding this saved his company thousands of dollars and a crazy air hood. You can see the shopvac style duct work in the videos above.




All the parts are moved around on little carts like this, all set up for a very specific purpose

 

[Rusted]

The next station was cool too. Their state of the art balancer spins the driveline so it can be balanced perfectly.

Tom put the heat on the employee there to "test how he was doing". The moment I was there they did not have a driveline that needed to be balanced so Tom pulled a previously balanced driveline from the completed rack and put him on the spot to double check it. I noticed he also grabbed one of the longer ones on the rack (which I assume was harder to balance). They racked it up and it was perfect. So Tom told him to crank it way up to see what it did and at over 3300 RPM it was perfect! :greg:



3316 RPM





[YOUTUBE]bAnHMUuDPnk[/YOUTUBE]


They balance every driveline that comes out of the shop like this. You would think that for a slow 4x4 application that "close would count" but every driveline that leaves the shop is balanced like this.

 

[Rusted]

Next station is the paint.

Every time I walked by there were different drivelines being painted, so I took a few photos







After this the joints are greased so they are ready to install. Wrapped in plastic to keep the box and your hands clean when it arrives to your door, put in a custom cut box so it fits just perfect, packed tight with shredded cardboard so it can't move and packed super tight. Then labeled and set out for the UPS guy to pick up.

 

[Rusted]

Next Tom walked me down a few doors to another unit that he uses for storage, receiving, testing, and to verify the quality of arriving parts before they are moved to the factory.

There are many shelves packed tall and wide with all the parts required to keep the factory rolling.




Each box is full of part all the same that look just like this. There has to be thousands of yolks in stock and ready to be used. Can you name the part number and all the applications these are used on? I can't, but Tom can :greg:






These are all parts to an Advanced Adapter kit

 

[Rusted]

In this area they also inspect each part that arrives to make sure it meets spec.

This machine will press down into the metal so they can measure the hardness of the components. This is to verify it meets their requirements.


The dimensions of each item are verified and if they are not correct they are put under the mill to be brought into the perfect dimensions

Notice the cool modified vice grip that holds the part onto the mill. The part sits on a die on the mill, then the vice grip is fast to hold the part exactly as it is milled

 

[Rusted]

I spent about an hour and a half with my eyes wide open taking the tour of the shop. And I swear it felt like it was 10 minutes to me. I could spend all day there watching the process and talking with Tom (but at some point he would probably either kick me out or put me to work )

He emphasized over and over again in every step how accuracy and precision was so important to his company and reputation. If something was not up to his standards he would rather throw it away than let it get into the hands of a customer. He was really disappointed in some recent parts he was using that had about a 3% failure rate. There were a handful of customers that reported a problem out of nearly a thousand drivelines that he sold. He commented that all of them received new drivelines and that the pieces that were failing were discarded and replaced with newer items.

Tom runs a very organized company. Everything has a place and a purpose and is well thought out. He mentioned that many of the tools he was using where made by him personally.

Here are some more random photos that I took, I wish I took a ton more

These are drive fixtures which are bolted to each driveline for balancing. These fixtures allow for balancing the drive shaft through the joints, exactly as the drive shaft runs in the vehicle.


A lathe that can be used to spin whatever they need. Not used in the normal process, but tool they use often.


Another mill to make parts, R&D, etc


Just a wall of drivelines. I never asked, but I assume these are just samples of common items


Assembly bench. Every part is has a place and is in that place. Everything is organized and in rows and columns.


About 20 joints assembled and ready to be put onto shelves


Bins like these are all over the place. Nothing is just tossed in, these guys did not even see me look in there, I just looked in a random one and snapped the photo.

 

[Rusted]

I have been slow at writting, but I finally have it finished! The trip to see Tom Wood and 4xshaft was very cool :greg:

 

[ChestonScout]

Ive been up there to. Didnt get the chance to meet Tom but his guys took care of me!


Nice write up man!

 

[lewis]

wow, I wish I would had them make my driveline. Nice work. I will give them a call about the front driveshaft I have yet to make.

 

[Crinco]

Excellent write up. I have been impressed with every transaction I have had with Tom Woods, he truley goes above and beyond.
Thank you Rusted for the inside look!

 

[Brett]

Great review! I still need to order a driveline from him

 

[Herzog]

I still have drivelines from him that were made years ago. They've been abused and have outlasted all my others so far. Tom makes good stuff! Nice write up.

 

[Badbuggy]

I second that. I have a long slide front that has been beat to snot, and still works great. And Tom crawled under my first rock truggy at Moab years ago and told me ,not only a bad yolk was causing my breakage, but told me how to easily fix the problem. He also replaced the TW Ujoint I just broke for free. He is a great guy.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Very cool

I've been up to Tom's shop in the past, he runs a top notch business.

 

[astjp2]

I needed my Rear d/s lengthened back in October, I called 6 states, 185 and minium of a week, I called Jenson, 165 and 3 days, Tom Woods was 135 and the next day. You can guess who got my buisness. When I get a shackle reversal on, he will get my front d/s buisness as well. He impressed me about 10 years ago when he was still with 6 states in Ogden and he still impresses me. tim

 

[Bart]

I was amazed that my drivelines arrived the day after I ordered them. You can tell the craftsmanship is amazing. When I thought I was going to need one lengthened I called Tom and he told me I could run it up, but that it would go through the system like all the rest of the drivelines. That makes so much more sense now. Great writeup.