Better late than never.......

[SurfGuitar141]

I've gained so much information concerning my Jeep Liberty tolling this, and one other forum, it's amazing how much I did not know about this vehicle until recently.
Just the other day I happened on a thread that discussed changing the differential oil in the axles, and it indicated it should be done about every 15,000 miles......
......I'm approaching 30,000 miles and never gave it a thought, so this afternoon I pulled my home made skid plate off the front, and dumped the old oil out, and man did it look like it needed changing too.....

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The front was easy, drain plug on the bottom, fill plug approx half way up the housing, drained the old, pumped in the new....then off to the back axle....and this is where things got weird.....

The manual says that both front and rear axles have the two plug arrangement, the front has it, the rear does not...no drain plug....????

and the filler plug is a rubber bung, not even a threaded plug.....WTF.....????

I had to unbolt the cover to drain the oil, I've done this on vehicles ranging from Toyota pickups to military surplus M-35's, and I've never seen an axle that didn't have a drain plug / filler plug combination.....
If that isn't weird enough, no gasket......WTF...again.....???
This cover was sealed on with RTV sealant, and thank God I had some in my shop or I would of been screwed until tomorrow morning when the hardware store opens....(actually I always try to keep a tube of it around for such emergencies).....

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The silver lining around this cloud was, it gave me the chance to check for metal shavings on the magnet, found some minor...(to be expected)...crumbs stuck to it, wiped it out as clean as I could, resealed the cover with fresh RTV sealant, bolted it back together, and pumped in fresh gear oil.....

Another maintenance task out of the way.......

 

[staindvans]

i just did this a few weeks ago. first time doing anything like it and it went pretty good. i spilled a little of the old oil but oh well. however, that gear oil in the back stinks, ALOT. it seriously smelled like sulfur/rotten eggs. it was gross. other than that not that hard at all.

 

[Vtolds]

I just did mine a month or so ago, I thought it was super easy.

 

[SurfGuitar141]

I just did mine a month or so ago, I thought it was super easy.

It was very easy....

To explain better, I've changed the diff oil on my old SFA Toyota pickup a few times, and "BOTH" axles had drain & fill plugs. I've changed the diff oil on military surplus M-35's many times, and they all have drain & fill plugs.
I looked at the manual before doing this and the manual said that both axles had drain & fill plugs, so I was a little stumped when I got to the rear axle to find there was no drain plug, and the fill plug was a rubber bung stuffed into a hole in the diff cover, and not a threaded plug like is on the front. Plus the fact that there was no gasket material between the axle housing and diff cover, just RTV sealant.

Beyond that the task itself was a breeze, especially since I have a 1 gallon gear oil pump for refilling, that makes it real easy.......

 

[bmrrwolfe]

Front is done, and I bought the stuff to do the rear but still need to do that.. Tuesday is the day off so that sounds good to me

 

[jeeper4life]

I just did mine a couple weeks ago also, pretty easy job..

 

[LibertyFever]

On my YJ I've been known to do this chore in the parking lot of the motel that I'm staying in but I've never changed the diff fluid in my Libby. I've always let the garage do it for me since it was under warranty. No that my Libby is out of warranty it will be my job of changing the fluids.

The dealership uses the same method of replacing diff fluid by simply pumping out the old and pumping in fresh fluid. Myself I prefer to take the covers off because I like to inspect the condition of the gears plus the diff fluid it real thick and hard to pump out/in.

Thanks for posting the pic of your rear 8.25" rear axle opened up. I've always wondered about the tone ring and where it was and that pic clearly shows it.

Your gears look in good condition and so does your diff fluid and I imagine that the dealership has replaced your diff fluids before now under warranty. As a side note; when you discover your diff fluid is milky then it's time to replace an axle or pinion seal.

 

[SurfGuitar141]

I imagine that the dealership has replaced your diff fluids before now under warranty.

Actually....."NO"....

The dealer that sold me this Liberty went to jail about two months after I purchased it.
Seems they were taking trade-in's that weren't paid off, and not paying them off, the previous owners were getting collection notices on vehicles they no longer owned.....

When Jeep put out a recall for ball joints, I had to take my KJ to a different dealership, beyond that I have done all the maintenance on this Jeep myself.....
Oil & filter changes
Radiator flushing
Spark plugs
new muffler

Next task will be to change the ATF+4 in my transfer case, but when it comes to dropping the auto trans pan, I may get a shop to do that one....