8.8 Pinion seal

[Soule88]

I have an 8.8 in my s10 project.
Discovered the pinion seal is weeping just slightly, I have the driveshaft and trans out for other stuff so nows probably the time to deal with this. What are your guys thoughts on just rattling the pinion nut off, swapping the seal and reassembling? I think Ive seen guys either counting/marking the threads, torqueing the pinion nut to 125-150 ft lbs and sending it and Other guys claiming if you don't replace the crush sleeve and do all of the work they self destruct.. Thoughts?

 

[F***roads]

from personal experience, if you just send a new seal, and re use the crush sleeve. use Loctite. or better yet a new nut. my 8.8 self destructed / ate the pinion. that was the beginning to my ton swap

 

[RunningProblem]

A crush sleeve is $2 from an auto parts store.
a pinion nut is pretty cheap.

A ring a pinion set is more expensive and takes longer if the pinion Nut comes loose. Plus you’ll get to buy another pinion seal.

Do it the right way.

 

[WaterH]

I have had a pinion nut got loose and just tightened it up. Lasted probubly 50 thousand miles, than it got loose again. Tightened it up again for another 50K. At that point, I was swapping housings because of bent tubes. When I took it apart, I found a chipped tooth on the ring gear. I have no idea if that was related.

I would say if this is a nice rig, do it right. If it’s a beater, don’t worry, be happy.

 

[arse_sidewards]

Get a spacer kit. Measure the crush sleeve and install spacer plus shims equal to that. It's not rocket science.

 

[Thatg9659]

I did a dirty ratio swap in an 8.8 once, few months later getting unstuck from ice was it's Demise 100mph wheelspeed, I listened to the pinion bearings whine until they grumbled then threw an entire $100 axle under it.

Pulling the axles and the diff only seems obnoxious now.

 

[welndmn]

You can do it the wrong way but right enough...

Pull the axle shafts and use a inch lbs beam style torque wrench and measure the rolling resistance of the current yoke.
When you install the new seal, match that rolling torque, go slow.
if you over torque the nut and get a higher rolling torque on the pinion, you might have over preloaded the bearings.

 

[arse_sidewards]

You can do it the wrong way but right enough...

Pull the axle shafts and use a inch lbs beam style torque wrench and measure the rolling resistance of the current yoke.
When you install the new seal, match that rolling torque, go slow.
if you over torque the nut and get a higher rolling torque on the pinion, you might have over preloaded the bearings.

The new torque will be higher by a couple inch points all else equal just from the new seal.