Possible oil leak on 2019? Suggestions

I am at 29k miles and I happened to noticed a couple beads of oil that were about to drip underneath the truck. I am not familiar at all with underneath the truck and what many parts are what. I circled the area that the oil was (of course i forgot to take the pics before I wiped everything down). Any insight would be helpful. mainly want to know if it's serious enough to worry. I work right next to Toyota if its worth dropping it off tomorrow. thanks for any help!

 

So that looks like your transfer case. What color was the oil? How thick was it? (like pretty watery or thick oil?). Have you recently put your truck into 4H/4L? If so, how did it go? Did it take longer than normal? Did you hear any funky noises?

I think the biggest indicator of how serious it is, is to know how much it's leaking. Have you noticed oil stains on your driveway / garage?

 

driveway doesn't have any stains. wondering if i noticed the first time its happening. it hasn't been in 4wd in a few months. oil was fairly loose, wasn't gunky at all, and not crazy dark. truck itself has not been making any weird noises

 

I would keep on checking to see if it happens again. The guys at the dealership are going to just do the same thing

Update the post if you get photos of the oil

 

will do, just went outside to check on it after i wiped it down (about 2 hours ago) and there was no sign on any drips. we will see tomorrow morning before and after my drive to work.

 

It's a '19 with 29K on the clock. The thing to do is hide thee to the dealership, and even if they won't take action because it doesn't meet the Toyota benchmark to be classified as a leak, at least get it documented.

 

yeah i think if i see it show up again ill take it in when the leak is 100% visible to the tech

 

Just curious, what caused you to look under the truck in the first place? When was the last time you looked at the same components and didn’t notice any residue?

That is the transfer case and the 2 larger bolts in the first pic are the drain and fill plugs (fill is upper right, drain lower left)….. at 29k miles I’d assume it never been changed since it’s not within age or mileage for a drain and fill, but the little bit of residue you showed just kind of looks like residual from someone draining and not wiping off the excess, then it collects dirt and spreads out over the case.

I would wipe it down well and check on it again weekly until you see a change. Maybe you just ran over a greasy/oily puddle.

I have 89k miles on my nearly 5 year old truck, swapped the transfer case fluid at 40k myself and it is as bone dry now as it every has been…. But your’s isn’t collecting around the gasket or those bolts that I can see in the picture so really hard to tell.

I wouldn’t be overly concerned about it.

 

I just saw a post of how some people were greasing their u joints and saying that they weren't sufficiently greased from factory (any insight on this?), so i was under the truck out of curiosity just trying to locate where the fittings were that you can add grease and happened to notice the transfer case at that point.


yeah i made the stupid mistake of cleaning it all off and wiping it down THEN remembering that I have a whole community that i could ask haha so i know the pictures weren't as much help as they could've been.

 

For what’s it’s worth, 2 months ago my 2018 4runner had some oil around the transfer case Ended up being a seal. Warranty will cover it. Had 34k on the odometer. Luckily I bought an extended warranty with it. It’s more likely just a failed seal.

 

thanks for the info! that kinda seems to be what some other people are experiencing as well the more im looking into this

 

It wasn't stupid; just a natural reflexive action exacerbated by the fact that you were understandably pissed/upset.

 

I believe that early models, like 2016, had a couple zerk fittings and serviceable u-joints…. My 2017 does not. There was some threads back in the day talking about not being filled from the factory, IMO….. just my opinion, I fell those serviceable u-joints probably did come with the amount of grease they needed inside the casing from the factory. When you fill those with a grease gun, the process is to fill until grease comes back out…. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they came filled seam to seam from the factory, causing some to interpret that as “underfilled”. I know several people won’t share my opinion on that so take it with a grain of salt. It’s not like there are several threads in the past couple years of toasted u-joints, proving all those out there that were serviceable had a proper fill as they weren’t grenading after several miles of wear and heat. Most people aren’t checking them anyway, the people on TW are generally the outliers.

A picture before you wiped it would tell a lot more, but you did the right thing…. Clean and observe. That is what will ultimately tell you if you have a problem or not.

Another issue from the early days was potential leaking on the rear diff… so I checked mine and there is some oil residue around a couple bolts….. so I cleaned and observed it, and it’s looks exactly the same 75k miles later. I did a drain/fill at 40k miles, zero issues.

 

yeah that was they very first time i saw a thread about the u joint thing and really haven't read it anywhere else so i wasn't really overly concerned with it.

i remember the rear diff leak recall when i had my 2016. everything is dry on my 2019 rear diff. i am getting regeared in about a week tho so i'll be under the truck a little bit more for awhile once that is done just to check any make sure everything is holding tight and sealed properly.

 

Nice.

If that is the case, after the re-gear I would get under and wipe everything down on those diffs and transfer case since you will be eye balling for leaks anyway…. Then when you do your fluid swap after the break-in period on the diffs, grab the extra 2 liters of the same fluid used on the diffs and swap the fluid in the t-case at the same time so it’s all on the same life cycle. Just my recommendation, since swapping all 3 at the same time is about the same effort as doing 1.

 

true. good call. thanks for all your input. will update pics tomorrow if fluid reappears

 

Update. Looked under the truck this morning and got some pics showing the oil. Took it in to Toyota and they said it seemed like it was coming from the bolts the oil was and they resealed those bolts. Hopefully that was the fix.

 

update. that was not the fix... went back to toyota and they worked on it again the other day. Went out yesterday, still leaking. Just dropped it off again this morning for its 3rd visit.

 

Dang that sucks, but Thanks for following up, I was skeptical on the resealed bolts

 

yeah i didn't think the bolts would've been it either. I think its the whole red seal around it just isn't substantial enough. I saw some people mention that if the beather gets clogged it could cause it to expand from heating up but I dont think I use it nearly enough for something like that to happen. 95% of my driving is 2wd commutes to work 10 miles one way.