stripped front diff drain

Elusive

Elusive

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You gotta be kidding me. I finished my rear and transfer case with no problems (except for the mess), and loosened my fill plug with ease. Then i get to the drain plug, man oh man this thing must have been put on by He-Man himself. Oh well, an appointment has been made with the dealer service department to change my front diff fluid. Wait till they see this one.
 
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yup. Its not much of a hex plug anymore. I didnt think i was strong enough to strip that by hand, but i guess those bicep curls are paying off.
 
Yea mine was on tighter than a duck's ass. I believe it is a 10 mm hex key. I bought a 10 mm socket hex driver so I can use my ratchet/breaker-bar
 
Wow, that's going to be a pain in the a$$ to fix. Either that or you're stuck with that gear oil for the life of the truck :) To make you feel better, when I went to change the front diff fluid on my T4R with 50K miles it was so clean I ended up not changing it.
 
No problems with mine what so ever. It's torqued to 36 ft/lbf, therefore shouldn't be a problem removing unless it's rusted. Also, dont forget that hex-shaped ring outside is welded rim to protect the drain bolt from rocks on the trail - do not try to remove that. If, however, drain bolt got cross-treaded or just plain wrong tread for the case you might have issues. Just make sure that dealer checks the case tread before installing new bolt. Good Luck.
 
fixed

Figured i would give an update. I took it to the dealer, they just used bolt out and it popped right out. They replaced the hex plug with a new one, filled my front diff with the amsoil gear lube i bought and charged me $45. Pretty good deal i say. They said that those front hex plugs strip all the time, and its no big deal to get out.
 
what is bolt out?

I have this problem and I planned to weld something to the front of the plug to give me enought to remove it.
 
greasefingers said:
Yea mine was on tighter than a duck's ass. I believe it is a 10 mm hex key. I bought a 10 mm socket hex driver so I can use my ratchet/breaker-bar
Click to expand...

That's exactly what I did and the damn thing still stripped out. I was super careful to fit the 10 mm key in there and be "gentle" with the breaker bar - meaning no jerking it around and keeping it on line so as not to tilt the key in the bolt. Didn't matter, I was so pissed! :dammit: I figure since my T-case fluid was so clean, the front diff probably is, too. But the guy who paid the stealer $45 for that service gives me hope :clap: !
 
Figured id bump this cus I'm having the same issue. Although, mine isn't stripped out (yet) but the plug will not budge. Ive used bout every bone in my 160lb body and it's not comin out. Any tips on this?
 
Obviously this is pretty common! I also had ape-man tighten mine and ended up welding a large nut on the stripped plug. Then just used a breaker bar and got it off and replaced the plug and torqued correctly.
 
lol I think fantastic 4 got a hold of mine cus it wont budge. I finally got pissed and gave up after busting the same knuckle 3 times. Guess, I'll take it to the dealer. Doesn't seem like they'll rape me too bad. Then again, I'm sure prices have gone up since 2007, no bueno.
 
This was the only plug that gave me troubles when I changed my fluids as well. Managed to get it out before it was totally stripped with an air impact gun, and replaced it with a new plug. Interestingly, the stripped plug was a 12mm hex, and the replacement was a 10mm hex fitting. And both had magnets, so they were definitely drain plugs. Weird.
 
IanB said:
This was the only plug that gave me troubles when I changed my fluids as well. Managed to get it out before it was totally stripped with an air impact gun, and replaced it with a new plug. Interestingly, the stripped plug was a 12mm hex, and the replacement was a 10mm hex fitting. And both had magnets, so they were definitely drain plugs. Weird.
Click to expand...

it's been noted that in '99 they changed to a 10mm for both the drain and fill plugs. So, they probably didn't carry the 12 anymore and gave you a 10. Either way works. I just know I'm letting the dealer take care of this, and for anyone wanting to know.. it's still only $45 dollars :D

Here is a pretty good good write-up I found about changing/draining your 3rd Gen 4Runner front, rear, manual transmission, and transfer case. Click
 
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