Rear axle seal leak

WolfGT

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#1
The passenger side axle seal is leaking on the TJ. I topped it off this evening and it took two of the gear oil bottles (quarts? Not sure). I just went out and took a look and it is leaking. My question is, can it get low enough to cause damage leaking from the axle seal? If I remember correctly, that 8.8 holds over a gallon. I'm just concerned about driving it to Harlan. Don't want to trash the ARB.


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#2
How bad is the leak? Is it a constant drip? Also remember as things heat up fluid will get warm and that leak could get worse after a couple hours on the interstate. Me I'd toss a new seal in being Harlan is still this far out. If you don't wanna do that toss a couple quarts in the tool box and keep and eye on it at each stop.
 
#3
That is true. But, sometimes when a seal such as an axle seal sits the weight of the shaft can compress it in that section to make it leak. Sometimes simply driving it a bit will take care of it...

My car sat for about a year without being driven (smack me later) and dad called and said the trans was leaking bad. Well, it was leaking out of the output seal and you could actually see where the driveshaft sitting in the same spot caused it. I rolled it around the shop some and when we took it to Todd's it was not leaking.
 
#4
The cclip eliminators on ford 8.8s use the same seal as a ford 9", and 9" are notorious for leaking axle seals. When Casey had his we found that they were leaking around the seal not through it if I remember right.
 

WolfGT

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#5
From what I understand it is not easy to replace mine (an 8.8 with c-clip eliminators). It has been like this since the shafts where pulled to move the lugs to the new bolt pattern. So two questions:
1. Still my original question. Since it is leaking from the axle seal and that is not the low point of the diff, can it leak enough to cause damage?
2. Is there any type of bandaid I can do that will help until I can fix it?


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#6
Depending on how bad the leak is the risk of damage to the differential is fairly low. It can get to the brakes and fling all over the place causing a reduction in braking. I think that any additive you try to put in the differential to swell the seal would do more harm than good with the arb and it's seals. A lot of times people end up with fluid leaking out of differentials because they overfill them. Are you sure that you didn't have the fluid up higher than the seals? With the axle swaps that many people do the axle ends up rotated changing the height of the fill port. I know I always overfilled my axles.
 

WolfGT

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#8
The plug on the diff cover has never opened, it is jammed in there really good and will not come out (Solid diff cover). So we have always used the one on the front of the diff and I do believe it is much higher. So it may be overfilled. But it has always been that way and even shops that I have taken it to has filled it the same way to the same depth.

Well, I just did a little googling and found a couple conflicting results.
1. The way it is supposed to be filled is to open both ports (the high one on the front by the pinion and the one on the cover), fill it through the one by the pinion and it is full when it starts to come out of the hole in the cover. It should hold about two quarts. (But I think this may be for the IRS setup without the axle tubes in the equation).
2. On Jeepforum, it says that it will hold a full gallon and with the Solid Diff cover, even more. But then had issues with it coming out of the breather line later.

So still not clear on how much should be in it. But kind of sure that even if it leaks the way it is, it isn't going to cause any damage. But I will take a look at it later today and see if I can do anything about it.
 

LBarr2002

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#9
It should definitely not be filled to the level of the front plug. When I was first starting out with trail rigs and didn't know any better, I put a solid cover on my 8.8 and filled it to the plug. It took 4-5 quarts Which is way too much. The hole on the solid cover is higher but should only be filled to the factory level. I know you don't want to hear this but I would pop the cover and drain, then refill to the factory spec (2 quarts or whatever it is )

I had a solid 44 cover that the plug froze in. I called them and they exchanged it and said there was a problem with the threads when the cover was tapped.
 

WolfGT

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#10
With the way it is leaking, It may be at the proper level before I get to Harlan. It is self correcting.


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#11
With the way it is leaking, It may be at the proper level before I get to Harlan. It is self correcting.


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You will need plenty of degreaser when you get home. What a mess that stuff makes, it's going to coat the entire wheel well and inside of the tires.
 
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