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This is meant to be informative and a small story. I haven't found a whole lot of information on actual diff failures, so I figured I would share my experience. Anyone that has information pertaining to an actual failure, or is experiencing this issue, please feel free to share. I'll try and make this fairly short.
To start off, I bought an Evo 8, from a member of this forum which will remain anonymous. There have been issues before this where things have been said to be one way, and turned out another. That being said, this rear diff was supposedly a Shep built rear diff. This is in no way to bash on Shep trans, as I have no proof or receipts that they built this diff in any way, shape or form. Only word of mouth at this point.
So here we go...
I started noticing a new noise occurring coming from the rear end. I hear just about everything, as my Evo is completely gutted. The noise was not so much a whine, but a growl. Which eventually turned into it showing it's true colors on deceleration with more noise. Rattling and clunking noises began to occur more vigorously. Deceleration became very jerky, inconsistent and abrupt. After the initial noise, i really started to take it easy on the drive train, but could not completely stop driving it, as it was my daily driver at this point...
The noise was uncomfortable and I had just finished telling my wife how much I hate it and I need to fix something before it breaks.. Not even a minute later, I make a turn onto a main rode and BOOM... Wheels lock up instantly for a brief second, so hard in which my rear view mirror came flying off. I pull off immediately into a parking lot to further diagnose the issue. Obvious rear diff issue at this point from just from rolling it back and forth.
Fast forward and I get to removing the rear diff.
I drain the oil, which wasn't bad, still clear. The drain plug, completely covered in metal shavings. I continue the drain and as it resolves comes what looked like glitter nail polish, and then some chunks of metal that could fit through the drain hole.
I get the rear diff removed completely and at this point you could roll the diff from side to side and hear more metal pieces inside, like little rocks rolling around a barrel.
I crack the case and find the lovely candy pieces, complements of the pinion shattering.
Before i removed the LSD i played around with the alignment/ backlash from the pinion on the ring. what was left of it anyway. There was a lot of backlash to be felt by hand.
LSD removed and the pinion is indeed, shattered.
I inspected the ring as well for wear, and it looked very low on the teeth, another sign something wasn't right.
The pinion bearing was not seized or damaged and spun smooth and freely, as well as the L and R bearing on the LSD (other than some metal shavings being gritty).
I'm not entirely sure if this failure was brought on by improper alignment of the ring and pinion from the initial build. Or if over time the shims became crushed so bad the pinion fell out of alignment, inducing a failure. Or...?
Like i said, just my experience. If you have any rear diff symptoms, take it from what happened here and resolve it as soon as you can. If this has happened to you, I'd like to hear your next steps for replacements. As I am in the middle of either buying a used stock diff and starting from scratch. Or going through TRE and having a complete rebuild done along with a 12 plate stack for the LSD.
First pull of the drain plug and all its glory.
Diff removed. Apartments really loved me working on my car in the driveway.
Ouch.. My transfer case shattered in almost the same exact way.. I had the same symptoms.. I sent it to shep to get it rebuilt with a new ring & pinion.. Send it out and get back on the road.. P.S. most shops leave a trademark stamp on their parts so if that rear doesn't have any, then it was probably just a bad diff..
Mine is making a ton of noise on decel and going around tight right hand corners slow i can hear something is not right. Was hoping to make it til winter. looks like id better pull the cover off. Thanks for sharing.
Mine is making a ton of noise on decel and going around tight right hand corners slow i can hear something is not right. Was hoping to make it til winter. looks like id better pull the cover off. Thanks for sharing.
yeah the noise was suttle at first. then as it got worse I attempted to just take it easy. When it actually broke it wasn't even from pulling hard or anything like that, i'm guessing the turn i made, paired with accelerating in general, rubbed it the wrong way. good luck with your diff man. if you catch the problem sooner than later you'll have a better chance of saving the parts and money, and just make the adjustments that need to be done.
Jul 14, 2015, 11:03 PM
