KNUCKLE HELP!!!!!!!! I think?

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Bascially you have a time bomb with a fairly fast fuse. You should not have gear lube coming out the wheel bearing from under the flange even if he filled the knuckle with gear lube. It would have to work its way through the wheel bearing seal, throught the wheel bearings and the hub and through the outer wheel bearings before you would get gear lub through the flange. At this point you are really screwed because your wheel bearings are hosed, your birf is junk and you will most likely need a new spindle. I'd be pulling it apart immediately and replacing the wheel bearing/gear lube mess and putting the proper moly grease in. I'd also probably be putting new seals in again. I have off Dec 21-23rd. If you want to bring it up to MH I will gladly help you do this. It isn't a tough job. I have a garage with heat and the proper tools.
 
DJ-

Sounds like you're reluctant to confront this mech. Can't blame you for that inasmuch as nobody likes conflict. But the more you tell of this story, the worse it's getting. The latest is that now he didn't even install the new seals which is why you took it to him in the first place. This is all just so wrong I don't know where to start...:eek:

Take it back to him as soon as he is open and have him fix it and put in the correct seals. This is another perfect example of who so many of us here do our own work; just can't trust the mechanic who has no vested interest in your truck or you wallet (well, he does have a keen interest in that:rolleyes: ).
 
Don't walk away from this shop.....run!
 
A lot of trucks run 90w in the front knuckles. The fact that he adds grease to it is most likely to thicken it a little to help keep it from leaking out. While this trick might work wonders for those other applications Toyota has addressed it by designing the axle for moly fortified grease. I doubt seriously that you have any immediate pending diasaster but I would talk with him and ask him to correct this and use the recommended lubricant.

Where did you get an inner axle seal that was the wrong size? Or was it an aftermarket part?
 
landtank said:
Where did you get an inner axle seal that was the wrong size? Or was it an aftermarket part?
Click to expand...

Good question. Never, ever use aftermarket inner axle seals. The seal designed by Toyota has subtle but significant features that make it the only one to use. They are cheap and they were designed specifically for the FT 4WD 80 series. Saving $2 on a 20+ hour job is absolutely crazy. [/off soap box]

-B-
 
What I am reading here is a lot of way over the top over reaction to the concept of the birf runnng in a mixture or gear oil and grease.

As long as it doesn't leak out, I expect that gear oil is a superior lubricant for the birfs. A simple check of the outer knuckle housing, and a dip test through the kunckle fill (remove square headed plug) will confirm if leakage is an issue. Birfs, bearings, and seals will hold up just fine with gear oil as the lubricant, probably better than running on pure grease.

Landrover Defender 90s by factory spec use gear oil in the knuckles. Of course it tends to leak more. Some Defender 90 owners convert over to grease to reduce the leakage.

Grease is basically oil and soap. The soap is the thickener. The lubrication is provided by the oil. Gear oil is formulated for extreme pressure applications. I don't think there is any mechanical worry from the gear oil, as long as one ensures that there is sufficient lube in the knuckle, which needs to be done regardless if the knuckle is filled with grease, gear oil, or a mixture.
 
Agree on the "where'd you get the seal??" question. I know this has been covered well, but we have an incredible resource in Cdan to get original Toyota parts from at a rippin' deal. I'd order a new front end repack kit from Dan, or at least two axle seals and then take this to your mechanic. I can tell you almost without hesitation that he lied if he told you he removed your inner axle seals, inspected them and then reinstalled them. Removing them destroys them. They can be a (minor) challenge to remove so I suspect he just chickened out.

This is seriously bad work. It's low cost, and I can appreciate that he did it in a rush, but c'mon...to not replace the seal that's the ENTIRE point of needing a repack????!!!!! The story is getting worse all along. Wait till you discover he didn't have the right gaskets on hand and used Permatex, wait until you find he didn't put the shims back in exactly like he found them and the inner seal is now being worn off center (quickly), wait until the next guy to service it finds he stripped the delicate cone washer studs because he didn't know it's a low torque settingt, wait until the ABS starts acting up because he didn't know to take the sensor out first and damaged the tip, wait until you get the GRRRRR sound 6 months from now because he didn't know the inner spindle should have been packed with grease - shall I go on??....... You guys who have done this job know exactly what I'm talking about - chime in.

DougM
 
Cruiser outfitters is were I got the seal kit. for the knuckles. 91 No ABS. I bought the parts not him. I'm not defending him but its Saturday and I can't do anything until monday.

Rich " What I am reading here is a lot of way over the top over reaction to the concept of the birf runnng in a mixture or gear oil and grease.

As long as it doesn't leak out, I expect that gear oil is a superior lubricant for the birfs. A simple check of the outer knuckle housing, and a dip test through the kunckle fill (remove square headed plug) will confirm if leakage is an issue. Birfs, bearings, and seals will hold up just fine with gear oil as the lubricant, probably better than running on pure grease.

Landrover Defender 90s by factory spec use gear oil in the knuckles. Of course it tends to leak more. Some Defender 90 owners convert over to grease to reduce the leakage.

Grease is basically oil and soap. The soap is the thickener. The lubrication is provided by the oil. Gear oil is formulated for extreme pressure applications. I don't think there is any mechanical worry from the gear oil, as long as one ensures that there is sufficient lube in the knuckle, which needs to be done regardless if the knuckle is filled with grease, gear oil, or a mixture. "

I agree thats why I'm not freaking out. It got new seals because I bought new seals. I'm not totally a newb at this mechanic thing I just didn't feel like doing it in a foot of snow an 20 degree temperatures. I'm not going to trash this guy for making a mistake on the lube part of the process as the rest of the work was done on time and at a fair price. It can be fixed and I'm sure it will be. I try to not deal with people who will screw me thats why he said if I"m not happy bring it back and he'll fix it. I'd love to make that trip to Mountain Home. I'll check my Schedule and let you know. It would be nice for another cruiser owner to drive this and give me an idea on my power issue. I really appreciate you help and concern everyone. Like I said I don't get too worked up about things I can't do anything about at the time. What if I designed a fitting for that square hole so I could pump the knuckle full of axle grease. I guess I'd have to drain it first but it would be cool to put a grease gun on it and just pump it full. I have a C N C mill sitting idle it might make a good prodject.
 
Rich said:
What I am reading here is a lot of way over the top over reaction to the concept of the birf runnng in a mixture or gear oil and grease.

As long as it doesn't leak out, I expect that gear oil is a superior lubricant for the birfs.
Click to expand...
The main problem I see, is that the felt and other seals don't appear to be made to keep the gear oil from leaking out, if that's the case it won't be good idea to use gear oil as it will run dry at some point, maybe sooner, maybe later.
 
DJForrestA said:
...What if I designed a fitting for that square hole so I could pump the knuckle full of axle grease...
Click to expand...
While you could drill and tap a replacement plug for a zirc fitting, the filler hole is large enough that you can fit the end of a normal grease gun into the hole and pump away - no zirc fitting is required.
 
Seems like you already know the answer on the lube question, there isn't supposed to be gear oil in the knuckles.

As far as the inner axle seals that were "too small" in the axle rebuild kit we sold you, I would love to see them, could you please send them too me, I will cover the shipping & your time. We have sold & installed literally thousands of these kits and I have never had a complaint about inner axle seal's being to small... Not saying it hasn't happened, just saying I am yet to hear of it.

It is possible that FJ40 vintage seals were put into the kit by mistake (they are not assembled by us, however I will start checking the components prior to shipping.

A couple other things that may come into account...

1. Most generic 4x4 guys are NOT familiar with the Toyota knuckle design, especially in regards to inner axle seals, lube, and gear oil. I have seen them delete the inner axle seal (as they beleived it wasn't needed) and let the knuckle be full of the same gear lube as the axle... All under the pretense that "older closed knuckle axles did it".

2. I have seen people "miss" the inner axle seal completely. I have had a handgul of calls stating "where does this little round seal go?". Usually because they have not completely cleaned the grease out of the ball, thus allowing the seal to be seen.

3. There are those that choose to NOT replace the inner axle seal not because they didn't see it, but because the thought it looked OK, didn't have the tools to do the removal (easy to fix ;)), or they had bought a wiper seal kit thinking they were doing a knuckle rebuild.

4. The seal can easily be damaged by improper install techniques... if you are rebuilding your knuckles for the 1st time... do yourself a favor and buy an extra inner axle seal (hell, ask me nicely when you order and I will toss one in if I have loose ones... :D)

Hope you get it all sorted out, and let me know on those seals... I would love to get that figured out before it happends twice...
 
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Kurt your the man. I won't be pointing any fingers your direction any time soon as I didn't see the work being done so I have no idea if it was too small or not. I'll pm you the part number or something but no need to worry. This isn't your problem its the install guys problem. I'm sure they treated it like it was a 68 Ford and not a 91 Toyota. I'm actually excited to tear into this thing and get it figured out. I love to wrench on my junk but I can only do it during the spring and fall when its not too hot or cold on the concrete.
 
My bet's on this mechanic being marginal and getting afraid of the inner axle seal. In other words, the seal being the correct one. I've got money on it, so updated us, please.

DougM
 
forgive me for being stupid but where is the square filler hole located it seems like a great idea to pump the birf full of grease especialy for a person on a low budget as in student / unemployed kid. yooper2..........................
 
The square plug sits atop the knuckle housing. Get under the vehicle and look at the inside of a tyre. Then look on top of the big metal chunk on the end of your axle. You'll see a square plug about 1/2" x 1/2"; that's it.

Be advised that you simply cannot do a proper job of getting grease into the birfield joint from this location. The best you can do is fill up the cavity with moly grease and hope it sloshes around (after mixing with some 90 wt gear oil that might have seeped past the inner axle seal - AKA birf soup) and hope this birf soup lubes your CV joint. I'm not saying "don't do it" as that may very well be your only alternative and you would be better off pumping moly in that hole rather than letting it go dry.

Annotated_birfield_diagram_2.jpg


You want moly in the purple areas and wheel bearing grease in the red areas.

The square plug is in the knuckle housing in the approximate area (actually would be behind the trunion bearing portion) but you will get the idea. It would be closer to 12:00 on the above annotated diagram.

-B-
 
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thanks -B- nothing worse than a dry hole if ya know what i mean probaly will help this toyota stay out of the bone yard, i am betting it will reach 300k by keeping grease/birf soup and or gear oil where its needed or at least close on a non exsistent budget grease is cheap. vehicle now has 217k it is a 92 that runs great is this being penny wise and pound foolish? thanks to all yooper2
 
Nice pic -B-

Somebody's been playing with Photoshop:rolleyes: :D
 
Tom,
I'm photoshop illiterate. That was MS Paint or whatever Billy is throwing in for free with XP.
-B-
 
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