Rear axle seal failure question

[Toyotayoda]

Hey all, I went to change my rear drums yesterday and opened it up to find it caked with gear oil grease. I've replaced this same seal about 7-10k ago. I know it's a common failure but would just a clogged diff breather alone cause it to blow out? How should I fix the breather if that's the problem (without doing the extension mod)

I've ben through this on my 4Runner. I replaced the axle seals 3 times, with Toyota parts, and after market, nothing seemed to seal up. The retainers were in the right spot, the breather is clear, still leaking after a few thousand miles. This went on for almost a year, I had mentioned it to a dealership FTS (field tech support)who was also a 4runner owner, and immediately he responded "replace the bearings." So thats what I did, bearings, retainers, ABS rotor, outer seals, inner seals, shoes, (springs and the short bell crank cables cost $100 for OEM), and have had dry brakes ever since. My bearings didn't make noise, nor did I feel like they had excessive play, but they were OE with 280k and replacing them fixed my problem.

 

[BlackRustBucket]

Before you bolt the axle back to the housing, please do the grease test to see where the lip of the seal is riding on the retainer. If it's barely riding on the polished shoulder next to the bevel, you're probably going to have another failure. If you have a machine shop near you, maybe they could pull it off flip it for you and then press it on where you want them too. If they don't have the right tools to pull it off, they'll probably cut it off but you're only out the cost of a retainer which isn't that much. I've come to the conclusion with the retainer flipped around, 5mm of polished axle showing should put the seal lip very close to perfectly dead center of the polished surface. The polished part of the retainer is 10mm wide.

Good luck and let us know how it goes. Better yet, if you do go the route of flipping the retainer, take a couple pictures. A picture of your first grease test showing where the seal is currently riding on the retainer and then a picture showing another grease test after you flipped the retainer.

Will do!

 

[BlackRustBucket]

Sorry if I'm repeating what was said earlier in the thread, but by all means check the axle breather if you've done the seal work & still have issues. I had replaced seals, bearings,races & abs rings twice before realizing the vent was clogged , once I changed that it was night & day, end of problem

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Definitely will, thanks

 

[BlackRustBucket]

I would recommend three things. Do the grease test. Use an OEM seal not an aftermarket. Check around the outside edge of where the seal sits. If the seal was removed incorrectly it will gouge the metal and the oil will go around the outside of the seal even if it is seated correctly. This can be corrected with a good sealant.

Good idea, would rtv work if it needs it?

 

[BlackRustBucket]

I've ben through this on my 4Runner. I replaced the axle seals 3 times, with Toyota parts, and after market, nothing seemed to seal up. The retainers were in the right spot, the breather is clear, still leaking after a few thousand miles. This went on for almost a year, I had mentioned it to a dealership FTS (field tech support)who was also a 4runner owner, and immediately he responded "replace the bearings." So thats what I did, bearings, retainers, ABS rotor, outer seals, inner seals, shoes, (springs and the short bell crank cables cost $100 for OEM), and have had dry brakes ever since. My bearings didn't make noise, nor did I feel like they had excessive play, but they were OE with 280k and replacing them fixed my problem.

Interesting, thanks for the info

 

[BlackRustBucket]

Sooo. Yesterday I installed my spare axle seal and went to do the grease test as suggested by [MENTION=120071]mtbtim[/MENTION]. I saw no previous wear mark on the retainer ring and thought this to be expected since the mileage was so low on this new ring. So when going to do the grease test I tried 3 times, each time putting a bigger dab of grease on and saw no smears each time. I tried justifying it to myself that maybe I just couldn't tell or something because I was confident I had installed the seal correctly.

I had to stop yesterday due to the rain and began thinking on my drive into work that maybe my seal installation tool was slightly too small (because I had about 1/8th inch of space around the edge of the tool to the seal) and I must of expanded the I.D. enough that it wasn't sealing anymore and that's why it failed the grease test! I just went on amazon to try to find an OEM seal (which I didn't) and came to a search result of the seal it said I purchased a few years ago which is the same as the one I put in this time as well. It auto checked to see if it fit uptop and it said F no! Then down below it said for 02-04 something tundra... :frusty: I always check that before ordering anything so maybe it changed since then, I don't know but I'll be picking up an OEM one from the dealership when I can.

Sorry for the long post of my stupidity but the moral is, if I didn't perform that grease test I would of flamed on and ruined another set of brake shoes, ran my diff low on fluid and had another mess to clean up whenever I eventually figured out it happened again. Thanks again mtbtim for the detailed suggestion and I will post before and after of the correct seal and it's passing grease test. I will also check the breather still as many have suggested just to make sure.

 

[BlackRustBucket]

Update* haven't had much of a chance to work on this since I haven't been able to get to Toyota to pick up the seal. However, in regards to my last post, the part I ordered before is 90310-50006 which is what I'm finding everywhere for the correct oem part number. I think the seal is right. After looking closer, the spacing of the retainer ring and the abs ring from the bearing do not look like what I see in bigfishalldays write-up. Mine would be much further from the seal which would explain why the seals not meeting the retainer surface. Looks like I'll be replacing everything now. Must of been given the wrong part at AutoZone. Going oem this time.

vs

 

[phattyduck]

The inner retaining ring and the ABS rotor need to be pressed to the correct position - it looks like yours were just pressed all the way down. They need to be pressed such that the inner retainer is set for the position of the seal and there will be a space between the outer retainer (pressed directly to the bearing) and the ABS rotor and inner retainer.

-Charlie

 

[mtbtim]

The inner retaining ring and the ABS rotor need to be pressed to the correct position - it looks like yours were just pressed all the way down. They need to be pressed such that the inner retainer is set for the position of the seal and there will be a space between the outer retainer (pressed directly to the bearing) and the ABS rotor and inner retainer.

-Charlie

Charlie is correct in his evaluation of your axle. The shop who did the work for you had no clue what they were doing. They pressed the inner retainer and ABS gear on way too far.

OP, if you're going to redo this, I suggest you flip the inner retainer and have the shop press it on with 5mm of polished axle showing above the retainer. This should put the seal lip dead center on the polished surface of the retainer.

If you want to keep the original retainer orientation, I would tell the shop to only have 3mm of polished axle showing above the retainer and hope the inner retainer doesn't rub the inside of the axle housing. The inner retainer in the OEM orientation (bevel facing the seal) is pressed on with 5mm of polished axle showing. In order to adjust for the new seal design, you should move it more inboard by a 2mm. I'm pretty sure from people reporting doing this that you can safely move the retainer in this far without rubbing the axle housing. But, like I said above, a safer bet is to just flip the retainer and keep the retainer further away from rubbing the inside of the axle housing.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

 

[Renegade_Medic]

Charlie is correct in his evaluation of your axle. The shop who did the work for you had no clue what they were doing. They pressed the inner retainer and ABS gear on way too far.

OP, if you're going to redo this, I suggest you flip the inner retainer and have the shop press it on with 5mm of polished axle showing above the retainer. This should put the seal lip dead center on the polished surface of the retainer.

If you want to keep the original retainer orientation, I would tell the shop to only have 3mm of polished axle showing above the retainer and hope the inner retainer doesn't rub the inside of the axle housing. The inner retainer in the OEM orientation (bevel facing the seal) is pressed on with 5mm of polished axle showing. In order to adjust for the new seal design, you should move it more inboard by a 2mm. I'm pretty sure from people reporting doing this that you can safely move the retainer in this far without rubbing the axle housing. But, like I said above, a safer bet is to just flip the retainer and keep the retainer further away from rubbing the inside of the axle housing.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

Wow that thing is all the way down. I just went through this last week. The shop that did mine pressed them on not far enough down. My retainer rings were actually hitting the inside of the axle and I imagine getting very hot and destroying the seal. I believe you gave me some guidance on FB and it was spot-on!

 

[BlackRustBucket]

The inner retaining ring and the ABS rotor need to be pressed to the correct position - it looks like yours were just pressed all the way down. They need to be pressed such that the inner retainer is set for the position of the seal and there will be a space between the outer retainer (pressed directly to the bearing) and the ABS rotor and inner retainer.

-Charlie

Charlie is correct in his evaluation of your axle. The shop who did the work for you had no clue what they were doing. They pressed the inner retainer and ABS gear on way too far.

OP, if you're going to redo this, I suggest you flip the inner retainer and have the shop press it on with 5mm of polished axle showing above the retainer. This should put the seal lip dead center on the polished surface of the retainer.

If you want to keep the original retainer orientation, I would tell the shop to only have 3mm of polished axle showing above the retainer and hope the inner retainer doesn't rub the inside of the axle housing. The inner retainer in the OEM orientation (bevel facing the seal) is pressed on with 5mm of polished axle showing. In order to adjust for the new seal design, you should move it more inboard by a 2mm. I'm pretty sure from people reporting doing this that you can safely move the retainer in this far without rubbing the axle housing. But, like I said above, a safer bet is to just flip the retainer and keep the retainer further away from rubbing the inside of the axle housing.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

Wow, thank you guys yet again. I assumed it was fool proof, apparently not. Definitely info I will want to give to them this time around. I'm going to take it to a different shop and have them flip the retainer too. I purchased all new parts and just waiting on a couple, but could/should I reuse any of the parts besides the bearing and return the unused ones. They've only been on 5-7k miles. I'm not trying to be cheap but I also don't want to throw money away if the old abs exciter and retainers slide right off. :zoom:

 

[mtbtim]

Wow, thank you guys yet again. I assumed it was fool proof, apparently not. Definitely info I will want to give to them this time around. I'm going to take it to a different shop and have them flip the retainer too. I purchased all new parts and just waiting on a couple, but could/should I reuse any of the parts besides the bearing and return the unused ones. They've only been on 5-7k miles. I'm not trying to be cheap but I also don't want to throw money away if the old abs exciter and retainers slide right off. :zoom:

Just make sure you give them detailed instructions of what you want done and bring something to measure with when you pick it up to make sure they put the inner retainer where you wanted them to.

You might want to ask them if they have a special service tool to do the press work. Some shops take a cutting disk to the parts instead of pulling them off and you won't be able to reuse the retainers and ABS gear because of it. And, if they're not careful, they can score the axle shaft with the cutting disk which is not good.

 

[BlackRustBucket]

Update* been slow going since our daughter was born on the 3rd of June but I think I'm finally good to go. Shop pressed new bearing and had to use all the other new parts as well because it didn't sound like they tried using the bearing splitter so there was no other way to get in there. Feeling good about this bearing being oem since my last was not, and will be free of gear oil contamination. They flipped the retainer ring and talked me through what they did and showed me a 5mm measurement of the gap between the polished surface and flipped retainer ring. I remeasured when I got home and think it's actually more like 6mm of polished surface which explains why the grease mark isn't perfectly centered. Could be the edge we measured off of or worn ends on his metal ruler. Tim I'm a perfectionist like you so this stings a little but I don't have my own press and don't think it's quite worth the hassle since I checked it a couple times and it is definitely on the ring so I'm going to leave it. The axle nuts were not fully tightened for the photo either so that probably gave it a little extra as well. The first and second picture are before the grease test and the third is after. I'm confident it will work well, so thank you again for the suggestions and help all, especially mtbtim for walking me through making some enhancements and the detailed video. Last thing to do is check that breather and I'll be going for a test drive!

 

[JZiggy]

It looks like the seal mating surface is just barely on the retainer. Am I seeing that right?

 

[BlackRustBucket]

It looks like the seal mating surface is just barely on the retainer. Am I seeing that right?

Yes [emoji20] I don't believe anything can move though and as I tightened the 4 axle nuts down afterwards, it seemed to pull everything in just a smidge more which would give a little more surface. I'm going to keep a close eye on it but I think if I have enough bearing play to make that seal come off ill have bigger problems anyway. I could be wrong but that's the only reason I'm going to leave it. But trust me I'm disappointed..

 

[phattyduck]

Watch for gear oil contamination like a hawk. I don't think that will seal well, sadly. It doesn't look like the actual sealing lip of the oil seal is actually on the retainer, based on that grease test.

-Charlie

 

[JZiggy]

Could you pull the seal and try to seat it a little less?

 

[mtbtim]

This is weird because everything I've done with these axles shows 5mm of polished axle showing with the retainer in the flipped orientation would have put you dead center on the retainer. If that's truly 6mm of polished axle showing, you should be much closer to the center than that. When I had my axles done at Toyota, that's what we came up with and when we did [MENTION=139000]phattyduck[/MENTION] rig, we had around around 4mm of polished axle showing and we're a little off center. There is a chance the seal was deformed a bit pushing the seal lip in further causing this situation.

 

[mtbtim]

Another thing I'm thinking is maybe there's some variations in the axle manufacturing and you can't necessarily go 100% by how much polished axle is showing but just use it as a way to measure and adjust based off your grease tests. If it were my rig, I'd ask them to pull it back by a couple millimeters to make the mating of the seal and retainer better.

 

[BlackRustBucket]

I'm thinking more along the lines of deformed seal, that's a good thought. I don't think I could pull it back any without more deformation so I'm going to order another. Was one of the only things I didn't get a warm fuzzy about so I checked for sound by tapping a good bit. Didn't think I did it too hard but like I said earlier, my seal press looks like yours but the diameter that fits through the axle tube where it necks down slightly isn't quite as big as the edge of the seal metal if you know what I mean. Do you know what size the one you used is?

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