99 K1500 Sub, Front Diff Whine/growl

[jstutzman]

Guys, two years ago i bought a 99 sub with 180000 miles on it. It has a new tranny and rebuilt transfer case. when i got home i changed all fluids. The rear diff fluid was definatly old but looked to still be okay. The front diff however came out like clumpy chocolate milk. I did a few flush runs and everything seemed to be okay. After awhile the front pinion seal started leaking. i popped the nut off and replaced the seal. Unfortionally i didnt mark where the nut was so i have no idea how tight to put it back on there. I set it to 150 ft/lb hoping i would be close. I believe after this is when we started noticing the whining/ mild growling only on decent with or without the brakes on. If you just let off the gas while you were going down the road you would hear this. Well i figured that maybe i didnt get it tight enough so i bumped it up to 180 ft/lb. It seems to be getting worse and worse. do you guys think that just getting a new crush sheeve will do the trick? Or does it point to a bad bearing?. i dont know alot about diffs so any help will be appriciated.

[Draenor]

You probably ruined the crush sleeve. Did you check the rotational load with an torque wrench?

[jstutzman]

No, i dont have anything that will measure that small of a torque. I remember reading what it was supposed to be though. 5 ft/lb or in/lb? is that all there is to that? if i have it to tight, is it possible to just loosten it a bit?

[Draenor]

Its been a while ,but 5-10 inch pounds is bout right.*edit, Dont quote me on it* No, once the sleave is crushed incorrectly, it must be replaced. Depending on how bad it was, you could of put too much load on the pinion bearing destroying it too.

[jstutzman]

this may be good news for me. i would love it if i could just replace the sleave and bearing. based on my situation explained above, does this sound probable. i was thinking i was looking at a full rebuilt, but this would be much better.