Some background, 99 4wd runner 120K miles. Pulled rear wheel to install new shoes, and met the smell and sight of gear oil. Check other side, same. The diff breather is clear, so I figured its time to do the seals. I have not decided yet wether to go the full route (seals bearings etc). or just do the inner seal and hope the bearings are still good. For fun I went down to the dealer to check with them, quoted me just over 1100 for both sides, and then mentioned they may get in there and be required to install a new upgraded axle shaft (currently with a several month back order and couldnt even give me a price!). The service writer could not tell me how this upgraded shaft was different, or point me to any kind of recall or service bulliten about it. Any one else heard of this? I have searched quite a bit on replacing the seals and have not run across mention of an upgraded shaft. I am probably just going to try to do the inner seals myself and hope the bearings are still good. Oh, the toyota tech also said I would need to replace the soaked shoes (I knew that) and turn the drums because the drums would be saturated too. How can a metal surface be saturated? Wouldnt brake cleaner and a light sanding be enough? Thanks for reading my long post, and I appreciate any comments or tips on doing the seals and checking the bearings myself in the driveway.

 

They're not called stealerships for nothing. Sounds like they're trying to throw one over your head. You'll need the drum turned when you get new brake shoes, but only because you have new shoes and the wear pattern/grooves of the old shoes will imprint on the new set,not saturation of the gear oil. Brake cleaner and degreaser will work fine. I wouldn't feel comfortable buying 'upgraded shafts' from a dealer, I'd be bitching that if Toyota knew they needed upgraded shafts then they are conceding there is an issue with the old shafts. That means it's a known fault or vehicle defect and should fall under a warranty replacement or TSB/recall as a snapped axle shaft can cause some serious damage and most likely a wreck. Legally that probably wouldn't fly but that would be the angle I'd give to the service manager for pulling crap like that. If you're planning on doing the bearings and outer seals then you will need an auto repair shop or machine shop to do some of the work unless you have a press, but it will still be cheaper than paying for unnecessary parts and installation costs at the dealership

 

Haven't heard of upgraded shafts..yet..they do have a new design of inner seal though, it has a little bigger spring and you can see marks on the rubber portion ///// \\\\\ like that. 90310-50006 I believe is the part number. I just changed both of mine last week. I elected to just do the seals myself as they weren't leaking for too long.

I replaced seals, bearings, everything on my old tacoma and it came to like $450 from a shop, including parts cost which is a good amount of that.

 

Hey landozion, I know a little more about your situation only because I JUST got finished going thru all this.

I learned from the dealer that some 99, 00, and 01 runners were made with improperly desigend axles. It wasn't a recall but the owners of these should have been sent a letter and it would have been covered under waranty work for the first 3years 36k miles. They upgraded the axle shafts, bearing, seals and bearing case(i think). Basicly the new axle shaft is slightly larger around right where the bearing is located. I saw the new bearing and the old bearing at the dealer, the new one did look larger and somehow better.

F'ing sucks that Toyota won't consider this a flaw and repair all of them. Total cost for PARTS ONLY to upgrade is around $1100.

I replaced my bearing case (slack with bearing), bearing, inner and outter seals and will roll until I see oil again. Toyota said IT WILL LEAK AGAIN UNTILL THE UPGRADE IS PERFORMED. FWIW, The passenger side (all same parts) were replaced (with the old style) by Toyota by the revious owner at around 125k. They arn't leaking and I'm at 178k.

This is my 5th Toyota, I've always been a die hard fan but this is f'd up.

Good luck, give 'em hell.

 

Well that..sucks. Thanks for the info J-Ball.

 

Thanks for the info J-ball. I never intended to have the dealership work on my vehicle (my problems with this stealership go way back to when I purchased my 85 from them brand new), but I like to go down there and pretend I am bringing it in and pick their brains, and occasionally you come up with stuff like this. I am surprised that with all the posts on changing those rear oil seals this hasnt come up before. Maybe we have a reason to explain why some folks just cant seem to get their seals to last very long. Anybody know how to find a listing of the affected VIN's? I tore it down and took the shafts to a machine shop to do the bearings, its back together and no leaks so far, just have to see how it does in the future.

 

Yep, i've got mine back together too. Its gone about 400 miles and no oil to be seen. (I put quite a bit of Lucas oil additive in while I was at it) I think the goal is to replace the bearing, bearing case and both seals. It SEEMS to get the job done, though it may be only temporary.

I'm just amazed that with all of the posts here about leaking rear axle seals noone has come up with the info that I got from the dealers. If only all of us affected by this could get together and get the boys at Toyota to fix our bum axles for us.

Well here you go all of you owners of late 1999, 2000, and 2001 4runners with notoriously leaking axles. Stop beating your head on the garage floor, now you have heard....the rest of the f'd up story. Thanks goes to Toyota for the inspiration of this tale....