A while back I broke my spiders and side gears and sheared the cross pin on my front diff assembly. Rather than going throught the pain and cost of getting a new carrier and having the gears set up and all that, and not having enough money to go through a SAS at the moment, I wound up replacing the entire assembly, which was cheaper in the long run. It took about 5 hours, but this was using only hand tools, so i am not sure how long it would take with air tools. All directions are as if sitting in driver seat. Sorry, I dont remember all of the tools I used, but they are all common tools, ranging from 10mm to whatever it takes to take of a fill plug. I used sockets, 2 9/16ths wrenches, and an adjustable wrench for everything. Also handy is a cheater bar and a hammer.
I drove my truck onto ramps for this job. That gives me enough room to sit under the truck, and work on it from either the front or the back. I wound up sitting facing forward, right next to the tranny for most of the work,
1. Took off skidplate
2. drained diff, took off diff plate.
disconnected driveline (dunno the metric. I had 9/16ths wrenches (2) )
3. unbolted 6 nuts from both sides of the assembly (17mm) pain in the
with hand tools. To do this, you have to lock the hubs, remove a few nuts, unlock the hubs, turn the axle, and then lock the hubs again, and remove another few nuts.
MOVE YOUR LEGS!! ,in case it falls out after any of the following steps
4. undid the brackets holding assembly in
two bolts are on top of the assembly
one bolt is on the right side almost directly under the top two
5. Two bolts are above the left side of the assembly, right above the studs where the assembly meets the halfshafts. ( I think is what they are)
After I undid the brackets, a little bit of pushing, and the assembly falls right out.
6. Install is the same opposite of removal, you have enough room to put the diff cover plate on before you put it in there, so i sealed mine up and did it that way. install the two top bracket bolts fisrt, but dont tighten them all the way down until you have the rest in. Then do the right side bolt, then the two bolts above the left half shaft. Once this is done, you can manuever the half shafts onto the studs, and start installing the nuts. You need to do the same as you did when removing them, locking and unlocking the hubs, otherwise they wont tighten.
7. Fill with gear oil
8. reinstall skidplate
I havent had any problems, Sorry if this is confusing or hard to follow. If you have any questions, feel free to ask
I will post some pics later
