I was wondering if leaving the residue on the gears and such is not good, doesn't matter, or is beneficial to the life and functioning of my limited slip differential. I have used brake cleaner in the past to really clean out the pumpkin and gears, then compressed air to dry it out. But lately, I am wondering if leaving some of the residue in there acts as a "friction modifier". So, short version of the question. Should I drain, wipe, and refill, or should I drain, spray down, wipe, and refill?
I would clean it out, but I've been called OCD by my wo-workers when I used to refurbish machines. I would wipe down, spray, blow out, wipe down and refill. Leaving gunk in there is just making your new gunk as dirty as your old gunk.
That is the way I feel. Reason I ask is in my 04 Ram truck, I asked for a reverse flush on the transmission and the tech said "sure, if it is new, but if it is older, all that gunk is keeping the clutches working, and after a reverse flush, you will find that everything starts to slip because all that old gunk is old clutch material" or some such bunk. Sounded legit, and I heard it from two separate dodge dealers. So I wondered if similar could be said about the clutches in my limited slip rear. I do all my own work, except for transmission fluid swaps, because I can never catch all that fluid. And now that I have 240k on the transmission, nobody will do a flush, only a drop and replace. Sooo....wondering if the same is true for a clutch-type differential.
the clutches in your dodge ram are metal on metal disks. their is no friction material to rinse out. i see two pattern failures on the 1500 dodge differentials. the front pinion bearing will go bad and cause a growl noise, and the retaining clip on the ears of the clutch disks will brake and slide out the side of the carrier and grind on the side of the housing. this puts allot of ground metal into the oil which will kill the bearings.
The front pinion seal leaked soon after I bought it, maybe 25,000 miles, and they swapped it under warranty. No problems since, and currently at 225,000. But I swap the lube every 25,000 and clean it out, inspect, and use quality lube. I hear a whine, that I thought was differential noise, but it stops when I get on different road surfaces, so I know it is tire noise. Started as soon as I swapped to a new brand of tire. It has been a good truck, all in all. No complaints, and I would definitely buy another one.
