price is no matter, this car is my moms and is a daily and she also doesnt tow

Took some work and a few rounds of banging on it after spraying PB blaster, but it’s out and new fill plug, drain plug and oil is in. thanks for the help.

Glad you made it work, anytime.

Looks like your on a 4th gen? Will the instructions be identical for a 3rd?

Just did the drain and fill (first time doing it myself). Great write up OP - made it super easy to do.

Just followed this myself. One question though. I have 105K on my 07 and the fluids came out crystal clear. I assume the previous owner had done a change some point recently. Can fluids with 100k still look new?

Sr. Have you ever had to remove had experience in removing the whole front differential?
My problem is that i have gone thru three differentials and was told to remove the front driveshaft from the front diff to the transfer case and convert my 98 4runner to rear wheel drive. I was wondering if this would work?

Possibly. Could be the rig wasn't abused.

Bought mine at 140k with no service history for the driveline. Front and TC came out still amber and light. Rear diff was pretty dark.

Awesome thread. Answered so many questions. But I have failed to see anything (forgive me if there is, is may not have searched deep enough) about the logistics to support this drill. I changed my diff oil today, and a few things popped out at me and onto my garage floor, so I will post them here in the hope that it will help others. Is it probably garage 101 type stuff, but I have not done vehicle service for a long time in my garage/driveway and do not have the facilities of a professional garage and find like a great number of other folks, we find ourselves rolling around on the concrete floor or driveway and getting it done. And the little things help to make it that much easier.

1. Safety. Eye protection, Fire ext nearby. Any jacking or support equipment in good condition. Flashlight.

2. What to do with the old oil? Have several empty one-gallon jugs that you don't mind losing to put the old oil in. Have it ready before you begin to drain. Don't count on using the new bottles when empty. Drain the used oil off, using a large funnel, with each differential and transfer case, as you finish them. You don't want to juggle a full drain pan of that nasty stuff.

3. Rags, towels clean-up stuff. Yes, plenty this can be messy.

4. As I was not able to lift the truck up on stands or ramps, space was at a premium. I used quart bottles to pump the oil into the differentials. A gallon jug would not have fit.

5. Use a plastic tray or pan to put the oil bottles on during filling the differentials and another to put tools on. I had to vent the bottle as I filled the diffs and that da&n fill hose on the pump went everywhere, except where I wanted it to go, not to mention when changing out oil bottles. And when getting the oil overflow when full. A pan/tray would have contained the dripage.

6. I used a small plastic funnel and a short piece of ½" ID vinyl tubing to be able to transfer oil from the bottle into the rear diff. (This won't work on the front, gonna have to pump that one.) Make sure you don't overload the funnel and do this over a pan. A piece of tie-wire may help here. It is quicker than the bottle pump.Use the bottle pump to top up the final amount.

7. Spray brake cleaner or carb cleaner. To clean off tools, plugs and the area around the drain holes.

8. If you clean that area around the drain hole, you can see if is anything is leaking.

9. Old style cat litter open and on-hand to soak up spills, before it can get too deep into the concrete.

10. Buy enough oil plus some more. I now have to round up a qt of Redline to do the transfer case.

11. If you do stain the concrete this might help to clean up the stains.
A. Sawdust and solvent - wet saw dust with solvent and scrub stains with a push broom. Solvent will dissolve the oil and the sawdust will suck up the oil/solvent. DISPOSE CAREFULLY! IT IS FLAMMABLE!
B. Tide powder, broom and hose. Wet concrete, sprinkle with Tide powder and scrub with push broom.

My thoughts on the transfer case specifically. I have a 2016 4Runner btw. For those that are anal retentive like me and the thought of the wrong fluid (75w-90) going into the t-case keeps you up at night. After much reading, I decided to put the OE 75w Toyota branded transfer gear oil. It takes Exactly 1liter. I replaced the diffs using the popular Mobil1 75w-90 1st. Therefore I was able to directly compare the fluids. The 75w Toyota fluid is much different. It is much “thinner” in viscosity and ran like water. The 2 different fluids are nothing alike. I feel that the Toyota fluid is the way to go! Nobody knows why the fluid is different,and for those of you who are like me, don’t agonize over it anymore and just use the right fluid. I am going to do it every 50k FYI.

I also used the kitchen can opener to open the can!
Torque 27ftlbs.

I also recommend the Motive power fill
https://www.motiveproducts.com/colle...-1-gallon-tank

The "75" part refers to the viscosity, so technically they're identical assuming you're checking them at room temp (not full operating temperature). How did you compare the two oils? It may be a "fig newton of your immigration" (a figment of your imagination).

Just did this. Thanks for the great info!

Back fill and drain were a ***** to get off.

Front fill and drain came off easy.

If you have a long torque wrench and working off the ground, forget about being able to torque the fill plug in the front differential. There is not enough room to operate with a long wrench. Even on ramps there was not enough room. I had to buy a second torque wrench that was of the 14" length variety.

Used 75w/90 Mobile 1 in both.

The smell of diff oil is how I imagine rotting dead bodies must smell like. It is near the top of the most foul smell I've ever encountered.

Just changed my rear differential oil this weekend. It had 150,000 miles on it, it was black, smelled burnt, and there was metal on the drain plug. I filled it back up with AMSOIL 75W-90 using a hand pump made by AMSOIL. That pump makes your life so easy. Changing the rear differential oil has to be one of the easiest maintenance tasks you can do.

Super helpful, thanks.

I've used Redline gear oil in differentials of rwd cars before. Will probably use their 75w85 GL-5 gear oil when the time comes.

A Dead body smells worse.