Write off ????

Well here we are some 6 weeks after the truck went to Darwin for assessing and still no sighn of it.
The latest news is that the front RH stub axle is stripped which the mechanic says is why I could not drive without the centre diff lock in.

There is a report on the way apparently that outlines a few other things so when I have all the details I will be looking for some advice as to the validity of the prognosis. On the face of it it would seem that I drive essentially a one wheel drive vehicle. If drive is lost to one front wheel the truck wont go. Seems strange to me. What if I jacked the truck up and tried to drive off. Would I not be able to do this?

Having said all that I am a builder and not a mechanic;)

A standard defender has three differentials.

-One between front and rear propellor shafts (centre diff)
-One at the front between the half shafts/CVs (front diff)
-One at the rear between the half shafts (rear diff)

The rule of thumb for standard "differential action" is power will go preferentially to the point of LEAST load.
So if you say lift the front left wheel, then 100% of power will go first to front prop shaft then 100% power to front left wheel. Besides brake drag and some binding you shouldnt be able to drive off :)

SO in your case, if you blew up a CV (always possible) then all power would go to the point of least load (broken bits) and make a real clatter.

When you lock the centre diff then the power is evenly split 50% front prop 50% rear prop.

SO when you locked the centre diff, you were driving on half power to rear axle whilst the other half was busy mashing up CV, swivel and hub components.

Hope that helps.
Steve

G'day All

Well I finally got my truck back after some 3 months. It has had the chassis repaired and I have had KAM CV's and axles etc fitted to replace the stripped stub axle that caused me the grief on my holiday.:):):)

Things however are not all rosey as yet. I drove the vehicle back in across the top road through Arnhem Land on Tuesday and had to cross lots of water, (one up to the door handles for some 30+metres). I was replacing rear brake shoes this morning and noticed a significant oil leak from the front right side. Oil was running (pouring)out from the inside of the brake disc. The oil was contaminated with water. I have drained the diff oil, it was overfull, and replaced with new oil. The oil no longer is leaking whilst standing (it was before).

What I am concerned about is whether the bearings are running in the diff oil or seperate oil. The kit I bought off Les Richmond was supplied with inner seals so this makes me think the two areas are separate.

Questions:

How much oil should the swivel hubs hold and how the hell do you check them?

How much oil should the diff run if the swivel hubs are oiled via the diff?

If the diff is filled to the fill level is there any oil getting to the bearings? This is my situation at the moment.

Chris, the swivel hubs should have grease in them. From memory EP90 but I can't recall how much.

Rover Diffs take about 2L of oil. As for out to the bearings though I'm not sure either.

G'day Derek

As part of my upgrade/repairs I have the bearings converted to oil. I have out 1.6ishl of oil in the front diff, the book says 1.7. I'm just worried tha the bearings, if runniing on diff oil might not be getting enough oil.

When I drained the diff it spat out about 2l.

Cheers