2006 V8 Rear differential

[MaverickS2]

Long story short, the rear axle housing was bent in my 4x4 4runner which caused my passenger side wheel bearing to go bad. I bought a used axle (housing and all) out of a 2wd v8. I paid a shop to install it and swap the pinion flange.

That was about 8 months ago, and the past month I am getting rear end whine and it currently sounds like I have big knobby tires on at speeds above 20. Drained the oil and find a fair amount of metallic debris on magnet. There is enough to warrant concern. i tried adding some lucas additive which made it a little quieter, but over the past 50 miles or so it is just as bad if not worse.

Questions: I have my original axle still, what are the odds of being able to salvage the pinion/gears out of it? (probably impossible to say, but figured i'd ask)

Is there someone in the Atlanta area who does good work with toyota rear ends?
:help:

 

[Inv4drZm]

You shouldn't have needed to swap the pinion flange from your 2wd axle. I have a large 2wd pinion flange on my rear diff connected to my 4x4 driveshaft from ordering the incorrect one, and it works just fine.

The old gear swap into the new housing should be easy, probably easier than what you already did; swapping to the entire new 2wd housing. Toyota's 3rd member design makes it easy.

 

[MaverickS2]

You shouldn't have needed to swap the pinion flange from your 2wd axle.

Yeah I wasn't sure if it would just drop in with the 2wd flange, so i ordered the 4wd one and just told the shop to swap it. I am thinking the cause of failure is maybe pinion bearing from swapping the flange?

If I do the 3rd member swap, what do I need to do? Any protips basically.

 

[Inv4drZm]

Yeah I wasn't sure if it would just drop in with the 2wd flange, so i ordered the 4wd one and just told the shop to swap it. I am thinking the cause of failure is maybe pinion bearing from swapping the flange?

If I do the 3rd member swap, what do I need to do? Any protips basically.

https://www.fjcruiserforums.com/forums/maintenance-tech/135359-diy-3rd-member-swap.html

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...d-installation-of-e-locker-3rd-member.193828/

Here are two links I have followed, you don't need to mess with the parking brake or crack open brake lines to slide out the axle shafts a couple inches, I believe we slotted some of the brake line mounts instead, I forget exactly.

 

[juice4luc]

The 3rd member swap is honestly not to difficult. I recently did this to have gearinstalls.com rebuild my 3rd as it was shot. This video is on a 3rd gen but it is almost identical to the 4th gen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMTbgY1xQKk

I didn't even need to pull the rear axle's full out of the housing , rather just enough to pull the old 3rd out.

Hardest part IMO was lifting the new 3rd member into place as it is about 75lbs.

Hope this helps!

 

[MaverickS2]

Thanks for the help I appreciate the links! I need to pull my old third member and see what kind of shape it is in. Hopefully it is decent.

 

[Runn4est]

Thanks for the help I appreciate the links! I need to pull my old third member and see what kind of shape it is in. Hopefully it is decent.

If it can wait a couple months I'll have an 08 third and Axle housing up for sale. By then will have about 130k on it. Only replacing because I've got an FJ elocker.