M35 Front Axle Seal Replacement

[jkcondrey]

I used a 1"x8ft piece of galvanized pipe with one threaded end having a joint piece threaded on. Its just small enough to sneak past the gears and through to the other side. It also gives a bit more surface contact for hammering out the seal retainer. Ill snap a pic when I get home. But any lowes or home depot will have the pipe.

im going to be doing the seals on both sides. so i can use the rod method talked about. does anyone have any pictures on this. i feel like there will be gears in the way

 

[cattlerepairman]

I used a long-arm puller with two arms that fit inside the carrier. I used a steel wood splitting wedge (4lbs) that fit across the axle opening to brace the puller screw against and just pulled the carrier out. Easy peasy, no whacking with a slide hammer or threading of rebar through differential gears required.

 

[snakehunter1964]

I had good luck with a very beefy slide hammer/seal remover borrowed from the local parts shop. Worked great on 2 different front seals.

I do like Cattlerepairman's solution. No hammering required.

 

[Epilewski]

I noticed no one mentioned “heat”. I used 5 lbs lockjaw slide hammer for 10-15 minutes with no movement at all. Then I used an oxygen-acetolyn torch and headed the axle housing in one spot for a minute or two. The retaining ring began to move. Then I started heating on the other side for a minute. Three whacks and it popped right out.

 

[V8srfun]

I thought I was going to get this job done with the slide hammer but no success. I was slamming that thing as hard as my hands could tolerate and it didn’t even consider moving. I would still be working but the sun went down on me.

I think tomorrow I will try a different approach because my hands can’t take that abuse. I really did not want to have both sides apart so I think I am going to try cattlerepairmans method if I can assemble the correct pieces to make it work.

Aside from any ideas on how to get that pesky seal retainer out any one have a clue why my axle tube was filled with grease????? There is grease in there about 8 inches or so. The rest is just some gear oil.


Sorry for the crappy photo but I am no photographer and the flashlight was freaking the camera out. But without light you couldn’t see in the tube.

 

[cattlerepairman]

@V8srfun There is this stubborn belief that grease "flows". That leads to people packing cavities with grease, thinking that a bearing or joint within that cavity will, over time, become lubricated by this "extra" grease. It won't. That is why you see hubs and axle housings full of grease.
Think about it....if bearing grease actually "flew" then it would mean that the bearings eventually run dry, with all the grease having gone places. That does not happen, not even when they get warm. Grease mostly just sits where you put it and is mechanically moved by rotating surfaces it is in contact with.
Mind you, where grease sits, hardening, dirty and generally useless otherwise, water can't go. There may be this (small) fringe benefit of reducing the space available to water.

I hope pulling the carrier will work for you! Someone probably put liberal amounts of RTV around the outside or it is a bit rusted in.

 

[V8srfun]

Well I got them out but I ended up getting a8 foot 3/4 in black pipe and knocking them out from the opposite side. I did not have the right kind of puller to try that.

 

[Godspeed131]

Exactly how I did mine a few months back. Started to fight them then remembered reading about the pipe through the other side trick, and since I had both sides apart........3 mins later and literally two sturdy hits apiece, bang out on the floor with both of them.

 

[V8srfun]

I just finished doing all of my axle seals front and rear including repacking all the bearings and replacing the boots. I knew this was going to be a big job but never expected it to take as many hours as I had invested. Also I way underestimated the amount of consumables that would be used. I wiped out a whole box of gloves, 2 cases of brake clean, one case of shop towels, and lots of grease. One thing I did was got the same grease for my grease gun that I used in the knuckles so that there is no contamination issues when greasing the king pins. There is nothing particularly complicated or all that hard about this job if you are prepared before starting but it is very time consuming. I would encourage anyone that has been afraid or putting this job off to get in there and do it. You will be happy you did and much more confident in your truck when out in the road. The only part of this job that could be a issue for some is the weight of the hub/drum combination but they make tools to help with that too.

Things to do before the tires go back on include drain and fill fluids on axles, trans, and t case. And a minor brake adjustment then I can go for a ride and test my work. I will be monitoring my hub temps regularly from this point foreword.

 

[poof]

Thanks for the great info.
I start tomorrow.