Gear oil in the wheel well

teamjnz · June 10, 2004

Hey friends..

Just noticed oil spreckles in the front driver side wheel well. I crawled underneath to check it out. It smells like gear lube. I just changed it the other day. It looks like the oil is coming from the black rubber boot that covers the joint on the trans axle to the front differential, not from the axle to the wheel. It just started!!

Question

If I over filled the differential will it drain out this through the boot? Or could it be a seal going bad?

thanks

teamjnz

citydriver · June 10, 2004

Almost sounds like the pinion seal for the front differential..

teamjnz Posted on Jun 9 2004, 08:30 PM

If I over filled the differential will it drain out this through the boot? Or could it be a seal going bad?

Yes it is possible that you may have overfilled it,but you should double-check the level and adjust if needed..Dont wait for it to drain through the seal...I'm assuming that this boot you are talking about covers the front u-joint and its not the CV boot on the axle shaft...

teamjnz · June 10, 2004

Thanks citydriver..

I don't think its the pinion seal, if I know what a pinion seal is. This is what I believe the pinion seal to be. There is a ring and pinion gear inside of the differential. The pinion gear is attached to a U joint that is attached to the front drive shaft. (The leak is on the front axle) The pinion seal prevents the lube from coming out of the differential where the drive shaft is attached to the differential. Its not leaking from there.

I will try to explain my problem in more detail.

The oil is in the front driver side wheel well. I have oil on the controll arms, the tire and front sway bar. Only on the driver side. There are 2 boots on the axle shaft . (My original post I called it a transaxle. Maybe I used the wrong name)

One is at the wheel and the other one is up closer to the differential. I believe they cover CV joints. (I don't know what CV stands for) The upper one that is attached to the shaft has oil coming out from where the boot is clamped to the shaft. While driving, the spinning shaft has flung the oil on to other components and the wheel well.

Hope this helps

teamjnz

snoman · June 10, 2004

Almost sounds like the pinion seal for the front differential..

teamjnz Posted on Jun 9 2004, 08:30 PM

If I over filled the differential will it drain out this through the boot? Or could it be a seal going bad?

Yes it is possible that you may have overfilled it,but you should double-check the level and adjust if needed..Dont wait for it to drain through the seal...I'm assuming that this boot you are talking about covers the front u-joint and its not the CV boot on the axle shaft...

If over filling cause the leak, it can only leak if seal is damaged by it so either way if it is leaking, it will need to be serviced.

AZ-Z71 · June 10, 2004

Dude,

You blew a CV (Constant Velocity) Joint Boot. The rubber boot split and is flinging the the heavy grease everywhere. Shows up real heavy in the wheel wells. Been there, done that. The boots are on the front half shafts. One on each end, one connects to the the hub/rotor the other to the front differential.

You could by the boot kit from the dealer but by the time you buy the boot kit and do the work for one boot you are better off buying a re-manufactured front half shaft. I think the cost differential is like $40 and well worth the money. Don't know where you live but Autozone and Checkers carries them. (Sometimes it is a day to have it ordered - depends) You can get the entire half shaft for like $99 plus the core. Bring them back the old one once you remove it and they will give you the core deposit back. Pretty simple to replace. Maybe take you and hour or two.

If you decide you want to replace the boot only, then it is critical to get a new boot on there as soon as possible or you run the chance of destroying the knockle located inside. For the additional $40 I would get the entire half shaft.

P.S.

If you over filled it it would not be coming out of the rubber boot on the front axel. The rubber boot does not come into direct contect with the front differential fluid. The rubber boot near the front differential is connected to a solid metal collar which is connected to a small metal shaft that goes through a seal into the differential. It is possible that the seal is also leaking a little but it is a common problem with most 4 wheel drives and usually doesn't leak that much. What you have leaking is definately the grease out of the CV Boot.

poorboy · June 10, 2004

I wouldn't just jump to conclusions...There is a very big difference between gear lube and grease.

Check the front axle vent tube. It runs from the top of the front axle up the inside of the driver side fender wall and terminates there with a little plastic one way valve. If your transaxle is overfull it can force fluid - gearlub through the vent tube. It will run down and be flung all over the inside of the wheel well.

Check this first. If it were a cv joint boot you would have heavy grease not gear lube all over everthing.

AZ-Z71 · June 10, 2004

I thought about that but he said it is coming out of the boot where it clamps. I'm thinking a split boot if it was coming out of the boot. Should be easy to look at the boot to determine that.

The air vent is located on the fender well on the engine compartment side. You could be right if the boot did not split, it could have come out of the vent and ran down the fender well and dripped onto the axle or dripped back down the vent tube to a low spot on the tub down to the axle.

Kind of hard to tell without a picture or a description of what the constancy of the gear lube/oil is.

teamjnz · June 10, 2004

poorboy

You are right. Earlier today I went down to a local dealership and the service advisor looked around and concluded it was the vent tube burping out oil.

It is dripping down on to the axle shaft and getting flung around.

Thanks for all of the input. Sure am glad it's not a seal or a CV boot failure

teamjnz