Front diff broken?

[wtn4x4]

There is a terrible knocking sound that is coming from inside of my front axle housing. The noise is present when the hubs are locked, when 4x4 is on w/o hubs locked, and when 4wd is fully engaged the noise becomes violent. I recently installed a skyjacker class 2 6" lift last week. Sometime shortly after I installed it a subtle noise was made by the front diff, but it would go off and on. When I wheeled the truck for the first time the truck did great for a long time, but at the end the noise became much louder. The truck still can operate in 4wd, minus the noise I think that the diff is toast, but I wanted few other opinions.

 

[metalmacguyver]

Check your Ujoints first.

 

[wtn4x4]

they were checked and the noise is coming from inside the diff.

 

[metalmacguyver]

Well, the next step is to pull the pig from the beam and take a look at the carnage.


We like to see carnage pics BTW.......



If it is indeed hosed, the cheapest way to fix it will be to get a whole pig from someone parting a truck or the junkyard.

 

[wtn4x4]

Chalk it up to another nubile 4x4er. I forgot to check the outer most u joint Who puts four u joints on the front end?

 

[Sasquatch_Ryda]

You mean three u joints right?


Well six if you include the drive shaft as well.....

 

[wtn4x4]

Well, from what I have seen I have two in the right front axle shaft and one in the left front axle shaft and one on the drive shaft to the differential. Now if I could only get this crap apart

 

[metalmacguyver]

You probably want to grab a haynes or chilton manual.

 

[wtn4x4]

I replaced the outer right u joint and it was an ordeal. I ended up going to a machinist to use an arbor press to get that crap out. But actually, I was right. The u-joint went bad more than likely because of the differential. After replacing the bad u joint the noise continued and became worse. Now the 4wd is toast I am pretty good at fixing things. Not the quickest, but I git'er done.

 

[metalmacguyver]

While your in there doing the diff, you probably want to do the rest of the Ujoints aswell.