Whine after regear...need advice

what happens if you drive it and it breaks say within a few thousand miles or less? who is responsible? i would think the shop unless they specifically told you not to drive it, in which case it'd be admitting they didn't complete or do the job correctly.

good luck.

 

OP, you need to do something about this ASAP imo.

Sounds like the shop did a poor job. You only have 1 shim. You don't stack shims.

I had ZUK do my gears (highly recommended) and he disassembled my third member twice to add a shim that was a mere .003" thicker to get pristine engagement.

This is the level of detail I think you need to pay for for gears. They are expensive, hard to install/reinstall, and a failure of them is a complete disaster.

Find someone new and chalk this up as a lesson.

ZUK Gears Round 2 by Michael Rickerd, on Flickr

ZUK Gears Round 2 by Michael Rickerd, on Flickr

 

if he didn't have all the shims needed to align it properly, then he shouldn't have continued the job. guy sounds like a hack. now the gears are wearing improperly and i bet you will find a ton of metal shavings in there when you open it up again. you might even need new gears depending on how bad he f'ed it up. he did this with front and rear diff? hell, it may whine now even if set up properly because now the gears have worn in wrong.

 

UPDATE:

Went back to the shop for more info. Mech said he set the backlash to 8 thousandths, which is right in the middle of Nitro's 6-10 range. Said the drive and coast pattern looked really good, and didn't think it needed another shim until he heard the noise. I was being charged 140 bucks and hour for the labor, so they wanted to see my opinion before they opened it back up to diagnose.

From what I gathered, they just lacked the experience to know how to properly setup a Tacoma diff, and just did what they knew.

In terms of court or a CC backcharge, I don't think I would win the case. They installed the kit I provided them, to specification. They just didn't take the extra step to make sure it was tight work.

Thanks everyone for the help!

 

So just to be clear, they're fixing it for $140? I'd make sure they re-verify that pinion depth, as well as pattern.

 

i think you're making a mistake on taking his word for it.

 

It's just his word against mine until I get it looked at. Going to another shop to get it inspected and fixed. Probably @Texoma 's place.

Once I know it was shoddy, I can go the CC/court route

 

Said he didn't write it down. Just gave it to me off memory.....very suspicious.

 

As a regular Joe who does his own regears, even I write that shit down, I have a little notebook for each diff and vehicle. Today I could tell you exactly what shims I used and what the specs are for backlash, preload the before and after etc.

 

It definitely shows a lack of precision and care. This is what happens when you live 200 miles from the nearest decent town

 

Yeah, if you didn't get one of these I'd be skeptical.

He's saying he has memorized everything contained on this sheet of paper? Doubt.

ZUK Gears Round 2 by Michael Rickerd, on Flickr

 

Hope you get it resolved soon with not too much hassle. I know the feeling of a bad gear job and it sucks. Luckily on my last truck I did it on a spare axle so I was able to swap back and get it looked at again. This thread does make me really look forward to my regear with @Texoma next weekend. Tacomas seem best off with someone that regears them frequently so they know all the ins and outs. I can tell from videos that gearing my truck is far far different from the D30 and D44 solid axles in my Jeep. The only similarity between them is that both contain gears, shims, and bearings. They are 100% in the execution of the install though. Especially the front clamshell.

Good luck.

 

that rem polish took just a bit of material away I see.

 

The company that did it used a new medium he said. Best set of gears he has ever done. I was excited to hear that.

 

Another update. Diff's leaking gear oil in my garage. Looks like it's coming from the front up by the driveshaft. Don't even feel like it's worth even telling the shop to fix it.

 

Don’t they have some type of warranty on their labor?

Ask yourself this. Would you accept this shitty work in other areas of your life? What if somebody came and did your roof and it was leaking 3 days later when it rained, would you eat that cost too?

if they won’t stand by their work, then dispute the charge with your credit card company because you didn’t get what you paid for, then go to a reputable shop.

 

No. I'm planning on disputing with CC company. I'm saying I don't think I want them touching my truck again to fix it

 

do you think they are fubar with only 70 miles on em?

 

i've seen it happen with even less. only way to know, is to open it up

 

EDIT.. a later reply pointed out that it's almost certainly leaking from the pinion seal... not from the 3rd member bolts. Makes sense; the pinion seal is much higher & oil leaks down, not upwards against gravity. Not only that, it's coming out around the entire diameter of the pinion seal, looks like.

Maybe check the torque on all the bolts holding the 3rd member to the axle.

I read somewhere that those are prone to loosening even under normal circumstances; perhaps the stresses of bedding in new gears accelerated the loosening. (Or, maybe the shop just didn't carefully torque them to start with.

Also possible that the FIPG gasket-maker wasn't properly applied. It kind of looks in the photo like the silver-colored FIPG material may be going around the outside of each of the diff bolts -- as far as I understand, it's supposed to go on the inside of each bolt, otherwise the sealing action isn't good.