3rd Gen Re-Gear explosion…?

I have a 2019 TRD sport, 3” lift, Magnussen supercharger. Had it re-geared with 4.88s just over two years ago. A couple days ago I was slowly driving up my snow packed driveway and heard a thunk. Got out to check and saw diff fluid pouring out of rear diff. Looks like a failure from within the rear diff (?!) And it blew through the housing. Just had it towed to shop but haven’t heard a report yet. Thoughts? Has this happened to anyone? It seems like this shouldn’t happen, especially after just a couple years. The truck is not wheeled hard and just occasionally tows a very light 15’ camper.

 

Geez, that is unfortunate. I am curious to see what the shop determines happened.

 

It let go. It happens. Will be a broken gear or carrier but could've been preceded by bearing failure. Fix and carry on.

 

Agreed, although I think I’d opt for the 8.75 if I had to buy a new housing.

 

Spinning on ice is bad for diffs, not saying you did it excessively, but this happens. But it's the weak point of open differentials.

Hopefully they go easy on you and make good on some form of warranty, but expect the worst.

 

a little strip of weld to seal up that puncture and housing should be fine. one good thing about these rear ends is you can easily and quickly swap out an assembled 3rd member and be back on the road

 

Could look into either gear or installer warranty.

 

Ring gear bolt came loose/out and got caught between housing and gear causing gash in housing. Other 3 bolts were hand tight after 2+ years of driving. Mystery. Will be rebolting, torquing and back on the road soon!

 

So the gears are still usable? Make sure to use red loctite when torquing them as well. And clean the ring gear holes good so that the loctite actually bonds to the threads.

 

... but it's fun..

 

Fun?
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/rear-differential-major-damage.596261/#post-19992611

 

Oof. Yea that happens too. If the rest are tight other than the 3/4 you should have a rather simple fix for what was the expectation.

 

That's confusing "spinning on ice" and "spinning and going from R to D or vice versa".

 

Did you also use Loctite on the bolts?

 

Been there done that in '76 on a Chevy Silverado. Took out the spider gears. Had that thing wound out to the point it took 4 blocks to get it straightened out after hitting dry pavement and ice intermittently. Fun but destructive, had a hundred miles left on the warranty. Got it covered.

 

What does this do to the diff? Im a regular offender of this anytime i see ice or snow

 

When one tire is spinning and the other stationary, the spider gears are spinning/has differential action. They aren't designed to spin at high speeds, so they usually let go and the ring gear likes to go with them.

This usually happens when someone is stuck for 20 mins and spinning forever. We typically see a bald right tire to match the hole in the diff housing.

 

Are the front spider gears built differently to better handle the constant spinning they do? Or is it NBD since they're under no load and just freewheeling?

 

I saw a shaving once (thin squiggly flake of metal probably 7 mm long) when i did my rear end at 11k, should i be worried?