Oils

[Bounder Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Bounder]

Re: Oils

Going by the colour of the old oil, I'd say the oils had not been changed for a while. All the hex nuts were without previous scarring. Only the front diff drain plug in-hex had seen obvious previous attempts at undoing it as the in-hex was badly damaged. Point being it looks a long time since the fill & drain plugs had been undone, I don't intend to leave it for so long untill the next time the oils are changed, so hopefully the plugs will be a lot easier to get undone.

Bob

This is a common occurence with the front diff, the capacity is a lot less than the back diff and being hard to get to means it gets ignored or not done. I just had to replace mine after bending the pinion shaft after the bearing collapsed from lack of oil after the passenger side seal failed and lst the oil out.
Where do you get the aftermarket plugs from? Someone that does online sales preferably.

[wristpin Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close wristpin]

Re: Oils

Better to dump the inhex type drain plug for an external hex type. The front diff drain plug is the largest at 24mm thread diam compared to 18mm thread diam for all the rest. This 24mm plug has a 10mm in hex, so, regardless of allen key or 1/2" socket drive (granted the socket drive with nice long breaker bar should give good feel & better torque delivery) it has the leverage ratio against it. 24mm thread OD to 10mm hex, radius ratio of 12:5, the 5mm being the leverage arm trying to turn the 12 mm. It's working against you and even with the nice socket set you are really testing the metal of the plug and it ends up like mine with the inhex chewed out. You have a much better chance of getting the other plugs undone at 18mm thread diams and a far larger hex at 24mm. Your spanner is on the 12 mm radius trying to turn the 8mm radius. The only trouble with the standard 24mm Toyota external hex is it only stands about 4 - 5mm high with a dished head on the hex meaning the top 1mm of hex sidewall is unsupported and collapses almost immediately leaving only a 3 - 4mm rounded off nut height, rendering the nut useless, If only the 24mm external hex had a height of 10 - 12 mm you could get a decent bite on it with a good ring spanner and there would be not problemo...........ho...hum

I bought the after market filler / drain plugs from 'All Four X 4' spares in Kotara, Newcastle. Ph (02) 4957 1117 www.allfourx4.com.au

Bob

[RobboMC Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RobboMC]

Thanks for all the 'prior experience' listed on this thread. It helped immensely. I went and bought the CORRECT tool, it's a 3/8 drive InHex socket, and you drive it with a 3/8 drive breaker bar, NOT a ratchet; and you go to Repco and buy the top quality tool, not the imported junk at some other Cheap place. The small 3/8 drive tools fit in the narrow space quite nicely, and they are lighter to lift and hold above your head. Remove both the cover plates for access, lie under car and the small breaker bar is JUST enough to get the plug out, if not hang a ring spanner over the bar to lengthen and get more force. Make sure you are turning anti-clockwise to lossen! before you apply a large force. The filler plug faces forward and is a bugger to get at, put the socket in first and then attach the breaker bar. After success with the filler the drain is easy. Filling with oil is no straightforward task either, I have a nice oil pump that sits upright in a 4 litre container and pumped down a long tube with a smaller tube stuck in the end to fit right into the diff. Just getting the tube in the filler hole took about 15 minutes of writhing and swearing. Opening the bonnet sheds a little bit of light down there, a work light isn't much help as you can't see the hole anyway, I worked by feel alone. My 9 year-old boy did the pumping while I made sure the tube stayed inside the diff. Once the oil is running FREELY out of the filler hole you know it's full as, so keep your catch tray in place to catch the overflow, pull out tube and pop in the pre-lubed plug with some anti-seize on the thread. You are always going to spill or leave in the pump about 1/2 litre doing a diff refill particlarly this front sucker, suck it up and buy the right oil, Penrite are now selling 2.5 litre in 75W-90 so you can afford to use 2 litres to refill the front diff and throw the rest away ( assuming you have an auto and can't use it in the manula box ) Nulon have 80W-90 in 1 litre but it's not enough and you need 2 containers, so might as well buy a 4 litre and get 2 fills out of it,more economical. I'm lucky to have owned some sports cars over the years that had transaxles so I have 80W-90 in stock. Just buy 4 litres and wear it and get the right grade of oil, it's cheaper than a new diff! you've already saved $750 if you've done the whole chassis/oils/plugs/coolant service yourself. If you're going to do the full diffs/transfer case/gearbox service yourself I suggest you start with the gearbox, transfer case and rear diff to get some 'runs on the board' and leave the front diff to last, I left it for the next weekend and attacked it fresh, mentally as well as physically. And while you've got the front cover plate off take the opportunity and drain the coolant and replace/refresh.

Anti seize $10
3/8 Inhex high quality $15
3/8 breaker bar high quality $25
2.5 litres of the CORRECT oil $27


Replacing the front diff if I didn't replace the oil - PRICELESS

Get the point, don't skimp on this or any other lube job, it will only cost you ten times over in the long run.

On the aftermarket drain plugs, Toyota do things for a reason. These high plugs may be all good for suburban work ( like I do unfortunately ) but of you tear an aftermarket plug out of your rear diff on a tree or rock don't blame Toyota. The front drain and transfer case look OK to me, and filler plugs I have no problem with; but that rear diff drain plug looks awfully exposed. I'm not an automotive engineer, just an experienced DIYer, but this point is worth considering if you plan to go serious off-roading.

And there's no better sound that that little 'crack' as the plug comes lose and you know your effort is becoming fruitful.

[Brett1979 Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close Brett1979]

I changed all my under body oils recently too (done it before a few times though). The front diff drain plug this time around was a total f***en **** to loosen. I had a mechanic change the diff oils for me a year ago in Cairns before my drive home and must've been a real class clown because he did the front diff allen bolt up wayyyyy too tight. I managed to loosen the filler plug after a few cracks with the 450mm breaker bar. And subsequently spent a few nights persisting with the drain plug. I even soaked the bolt in I-Nox and then Rost-Off spray from work and left to penetrate for 24 hrs each.... Nothing! It wasn't budging. I repeatedly continued trying to loosen the bugger by placing a jack under the handle of breaker bar to try and pop it by lifting it and still nothing. I didn't want to ruin the allen bolt by thumping it with a chisel and hammer as the hex shape was deteriorating with my repeated attempts. So I bit the bullet and phoned the local garage with the issue who were a terrific bunch of blokes. They said to bring it down early the next morning (Saturday) when they opened and they'll have it hoisted and cracked for me fairly quickly while I wait. Hahaha.... Anyway, they struck issues. The bolt wasn't budging and they tried all methods within a 45 min period while I hung around and amused myself. They kept me posted at all times and joked about it which was good. They were even nice enough to drive me home 5 mins up the road to save me from being attacked by Magpies if I walked. They called me 7 hrs later to say they just got it undone, but subsequently had to drop the oil to fix up the bolt, so they replaced the oil. They put the car aside for a few hrs during the day to get other services done but said they had a bloke working on it for a bit over 3 hrs. They only charged me $150 if I paid cash which was good of them too. They welded a hex nut to the plug so I could get it undone in the future and to replace it with a new plug from Toyota at a later stage. To start with they light heartedly commented that getting frozen bolts off is no issue as they come across it at least a few times a week, but when I picked the car up they said this was the worst they had come across.

[big-trev Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close big-trev]

With mine a couple of good hits centrally to the plug with a good heavy hammer.Then a very good quality Allen key and a Six Inch bar and it cracked fairly easy.But as all others said undo the filler before the drain.Best of luck to all in the future.