So, I'm driving on highway today doing about 60mph and all of the sudden I hear a thud, followed by a noise that I can describe as dragging a stick on a fence . At first I thought I hit something but I was looking at the road the whole time and there was no debris so I thought that maybe a wheel lining came off but I walked around the car and nothing. Now when I drive the car makes clicking noises that correspond to speed. There is no noticeable vibration and the noise doesn't change when I swing the car side to side.

I'm about to go put the car on the lift to try to troubleshoot but I'm not sure what to look for? My thoughts are to check the U joints on the rear axles.

The car is a 1998 with 120K mikes on the chassis.

Any ideas on what to look for?

 

Not the U joints the noise is coming from the Differential pumpkin I only drove the car gently home about 15 miles, any idea what I'm in for?

 

You could always try isolating the pumpkin by undoing the 3 flanges. That way you can be sure.

The axle flanges have shims that you need to put back in and the driveshaft flange is separated at the diff and not at the jund coupling. Witness mark before disassembly.

There are very few repair parts listed. Seals, vents, shims and bearings. No gears, etc.

 

Well, I think Thundercat posted that he upgraded his gears to 3.55 in one post. I wonder how he did that.


Also, I read that the diffs are weak links in our cars? I'm wondering if there is a difference from year to year of the x308-s. Some searches seem to suggest that the long bodies had bigger ratios?

I guess I'm wondering if I should take this one apart or just get one from a junk yard.

 

ok, so today I finally had time to look at this. The car sat for a few days on a lift and now I see that there appears to be a leak from the differential on the drivers side. I know it wasn't there when I pulled it into the garage a few days ago.

 

Ad's - before you pull out the Snap-On, swap the breather for a new one and get some Shell Spirex EP90 grade in there and see what happens. A breather can block, pressurize the diff case and it blows the oil out of the seals. It might not account for the scraping stick noise(!) but hey, worth a shout.

 

Too Late

I didn't want to drive this thing any further as I didn't want to risk the ring and pinion getting damaged. I'll be starting a new thread for the rebuild. I'll try to accomplish it myself.

 

What are those? Regulation steel toed safety slippers?

 

My GF's dad's Polish Highlander slippers

 

Well okay ... so long as they are Polish