Rear Differential in 2010 Prerunner replacement

Do you guys know what the significance of the white sticker on the back of the rear diff. housing is. For instance my son’s sticker has “C9” on it. The mechanic says the nonlocking is a “C3”. The 2015 at my local salvage yard said “D1”. Is this specific to the rear diff. or, something else?

 

Here are the names of the rear axle parts. In your satuation, it's most likely that the gears in the 3rd member are tore up. I definitely wouldn't spend $2,600 on a used rear axle assembly with unknown history. In my opinion, the next call should be to East Coast Gear Supply. They have a 3rd member exchange program. Find out how much they want for an exchange E locker 3rd member. This would require your mechanic to clean the living daylights out of your housing and swap the 3rd member.

 

Check out http://www.car-part.com/mobile/index.htm to search local pick and pulls near you

 

A agree with using http://car-part.com/ to find a compatible axle housing. Search for an "Axle Assy Rear (w. housing.)" You can select an assembly with or without a locker. I've used this website many times to find parts that I want. It really saves time!

According to the website a locking axle runs about $1000-1200 and an open axle is $650-$900 around my neck of the woods. If you even think that you'd want a rear locker in the future now is the time to add it. It will cost more in the long run to add it later. Don't forget to check the brake pads/drums when doing the swap.

 

I love a drawing. Really helps. Thank you.
This makes perfect sense to me. I know that it made horrible noises when it went out.Is there any reason to think that something could be wrong with the axels too if the gears in the 3rd member were busted up? My mechanic has two lifts. If he gets the rear end off of this thing and then discovers that we need additional parts, he’s going to lose that lift until we get the new parts. I think this is why he wanted to go on and order an entire rear end. Any thoughts on that? Is the 3rd Member also called the “chunk”? Thank you.

 

Good info. Knowing which area to search has been half of my battle! Thanks for the instructions. That price difference isn’t too bad. So, are these salvaged parts or new after market?

 

These are salvage yard parts

 

In my opinion, the chances that the axle shafts are hurt, is very slim. I do understand your mechanics fear of tying up the hoist. Once the axle shafts are pulled, the wheels aren't going back on. There is always the possibility of putting a floor jack under the axle housing and moving the truck around, but don't know if he's able to do that with size of shop, size of floor jack, etc. ECGS does have a program where they ship you a 3rd member and you pay a core charge, and then ship yours back and the core charge is refunded. However, that makes your rear axle kind of the schrodinger's cat. You don't know how bad it's tore up till you take it apart.

I've never heard of a 3rd member called a chunk, but I call a carbonated soft drink a pop.

 

Update:

After considering all the good advice from folks here, I decided to repair the truck instead of cutting our losses and running. The mechanic pulled the rear differential off yesterday and it is destroyed. The axles are 100% fine. So, I have purchased a new rear differential directly from Toyota at my mechanic’s cost. I know you’re all cringing at the thought of me having bought from Toyota but, we are not car people. I can rest assured that this will be a reliable rear diff. that should never go out again. Once I learned that the axles were fine and that I only had to replace the RD, I was willing to pay the price for new. Having lost my 23 year old sister in an auto accident years ago, safety is very important to me. The most important factor, actually.

I picked the destroyed RD up from the mechanic and took it to Toyota to purchase the new one. I asked for one of their mechanics to look at it before I paid them $2,000 for the new one. They obliged. He was very willing to look at it. He rubbed his finger on it, smelled it and said it wasn’t the correct oil. Add to that that my mechanic mentioned that when he drained the oil it “came out like water” and “ it should have been thicker”. I believe when it was replaced the last time, they most likely used the wrong oil. Ugh. Ridiculous.

Thanks again to all of you for all the guidance. It helped me make a reasonably well educated decision on how to proceed. I really appreciate your time and that you shared your expertise with me.

*I wanted to upload a couple of videos here from my IPhone but, it won’t let me. Here are a couple of pictures.

 

You said this was recently rebuilt? If the shop that did the swap put the wrong oil in, is there any way to recoup some cost from them?

 

I wish we could. They most likely used the wrong oil but, my son did drive it on pavement with the lock on not knowing it shouldn’t be done. So, there’s that. At the very least, the man way overcharged us. We could have had a new one put in at Toyota for less than he charged for a rebuilt/salvaged one. We may discuss that with him. I’ll let my husband deal with that. Not my cup of tea. Thanks.

 

Just to be sure, I would confirm with the driver of this truck of when the locking feature should/shouldn't be engaged.




Edit: you beat me, just mentioned it above...

 

“Wrong” oil or not, that's a hard part failure. Any reasonable gear oil (75w-85, 75w-90, 80w90, 75w140) should suffice in a rear diff. Last time I checked, I believe a limited slip rear diff from ECGS was around $900. Personally that’s the direction I would have gone, having had 12 years of good results with the OEM limited slip rear diff in my 07 Tacoma. That truck is still on the road, I just don’t own it anymore.

One more note, gears create tremendous amounts of heat while breaking in, take it easy for the first couple thousand miles and get the gear oil changed after a short break-in period. The high heat created during the break in breaks down the gear oil. Changing the fluid also flushes out normal break in debris that will accumulate pretty quickly for the first several thousand miles. After that I would change every 30,000-50,000 miles depending on how the truck is used. A 2010 Tacoma will probably call for 75w-85, but synthetic 75w90 should be perfectly fine in this differential. You could also use conventional 80w90 and change it around 30k miles. I always ran 80w90 with a few oz of limited slip additive in my 2007 because of the limited slip differential, the clutch packs in it would chatter with synthetic oil.

ECGS recommends conventional gear lube:

https://eastcoastgearsupply.com/ft-2536-ecgs-gear-oil-recommendation.html

 

https://eastcoastgearsupply.com/c-1065072-assembled-3rds-clamshells-05-15-tacoma.html

 

I see this a lot where people recommend changing the gear oil a few thousand miles after installing a rebuilt diff. Has anybody ever changed the gear oil a few thousand miles after buying a brand new truck?

 

I traded my Tacoma for a 2017 Chevrolet 3500 HD, I plan to change the front/rear diffs and transfer case fluids around 15K miles. I bought it with 10k miles, I now have around 13k miles. I want to have fresh fluids in it before I start working it hard this summer. It has magnetic fill and drain plugs, I pulled the fill plug on the rear diff to check the fluid level the other day, you'd be surprised at the amount of goop that was stuck to the magnet. I wish I had taken a picture. It wasn't anything abnormal for a rear diff that is breaking in, but more than you'd typically see on a post break-in service.

 

https://www.marlincrawler.com/tech/diff/differential-break-and-care-information

http://www.thedifferentialfluid.com...rential Oil Change After Initial Break-in.pdf

https://eastcoastgearsupply.com/ft-1479-new-gear-break-in-procedure.html

 

I was able to upload the video to YouTube in order to share it here. This is my current mechanic explaining that he found give/play in the RD once he took it out of the truck and, why that is not good.
The Toyota mechanic said there is no way to know if that give/play was a possible cause of the RD destruction or, a result of the destruction. Just sharing as an FYI.

Thanks again to everyone who helped me!

https://youtu.be/1jfvay8JIQw