About 2 weeks ago I saw a few drops of what looked to be grease on my garage floor, I cleaned them up and today there were a few more drops. It was really thick and black, looked a lot like grease. It appears to come from the front of the car, almost the same place as if it was leaking oil, which it's not. So where could this grease be coming from and is it a bad sign?

 

I don't know if it's just my imagination but I could've sworn the amount and frequency of the grease drops increases when I drive the car in "S" mode on my auto trans. When I drive with the button off, I see a lot less leaking.

 

Carwatcher, you could be seeing some leakage from the rear seal of your transfer case. That would be in the vicinity of your oil drain plug and give you the color fluid that you are seeing as it would be picking up dirt from under the car. All you can really do at this point is get the car up in the air a little bit and see where the fluid is coming from. But, I would start there. Look at the tranny hump where the rear driveshaft meets the transfer case and see if the underside of the tranny hump is covered in the same sort of fluid.

 

Yeah, I'm planning on doing a TC flush later today, so I'll check when i'm under there...but like I said, this is really thick, it has no flow, so it's dropping straight down from where it's leaking. I don't think that dirt is making it black, since I drive the car very little, maybe 500 miles in a month. It has no smell and it's as dark as it can get, looks like a really thick gel or grease.

 

Perhaps someone added grease fittings to your car before you got it. My Dad always had grease fittings added to his car, even after car makers stopped using them. Old habits die hard. Why there would be grease fitting where you describe is a puzzle, unless someone added them to the drive shaft?

 

Here, I took a pic of the stuff this morning...I didn't have a chance to change the TC fluid yesterday, but I checked under the car and didn't see any obvious place where it was coming from, everything is pretty clean. And it's not engine oil, sicne I changed it about 1000 miles ago and it's still pretty clean.

 

I'm sticking with my transfer case oil. If it isn't that, then you are more than likely looking at something like an oil leak up on the block. Too dark for tranny fluid. Too dark for brake fluid. Too dark for antifreeze. Completely the wrong color for any leakage out of the A/C system. So, not leaving much in the way of options here.

 

Ok, so if it's coming from the rear TC seal what can I do? Just change the fluid regularly? I'll check tomorrow when I have access to a lift at work...so the rear seal is where the driveshaft meets the TC?

 

Carwatcher, if it is the "rear seal", most of the time it is actually leaking from around the center shaft/nut area. You simply remove the nut (need to remove the driveshaft from the end of the transfer case first) and then you remove the nut, clean up the area, put down some RTV and then tighten the nut down. That will fix the leak most of the time. If it is actually leaking from the outside of the shaft for the rear driveshaft, then you need a new seal there and I am not sure what all would be needed for that fix. If the leakage isn't too bad, I would say to keep an eye on things and start changing the TC fluid more often. Based on the leakage that you are seeing, probably every 30K miles would be sufficient. But, that is your call.

 

Ok, I got under the car and found out where it was coming from:



Seems to be the same as the TC fluid I drained yesterday, so I guess that's that. I just got to keep an eye out on spillage and change the tc fluid regularly.

 

Carwatcher, the fix is fairly cheap and take you probably an hour to do. You will need to undo the capscrews (allen head pieces) and drop the driveshaft out of the way. Then under the screws, you will find a large nut. Remove the nut, clean up the area, apply some new RTV there and then tighten the nut down again and reinstall the driveshaft. That should fix your problem.

 

Looking at the pick I am wondering how hard a job is it to drain the transfer case and the automatic transmission? Can you explain how you did the TC? Thanks