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New Axle

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Basil

Basil

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Just finished installing a new axle on the Santa fe. The boots on the driver side CV joints were split and grease was oozing all over. The new axle was only $87 so I figured why not just change the axle since the car has over 260k miles. It wasn't actually a hard job at all. Took the old axle out in one afternoon, and the new one in another afternoon. Each operation only took a couple of hours.
 
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Here's hoping there wasn't a reason it was so cheap!
 
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I had the same surprise with a pair of Honda Civic axles a couple years ago. One outer CV was FUBAR, went to my local parts place and the owner said: "Just replace the whole shaft." Huh? I was familiar with CV joint prices for Porsche-Audi cars back in the late '70's/early '80's and they were astronomical IMO. Figured any CV joint would still be in the high dollar range. Amazed when he looked it up and told me it was under $100 for the whole axle assembly. I got both sides!
 
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You might say I'm a little gun shy on the subject. Not too many years ago, I had a car fire caused by, I believe, a cheap replacement axle shaft. This was a solid axle GM, not a TR and IIRC the shaft was around $150. But on that axle, the wheel bearing runs directly against the shaft, which is obviously supposed to be hardened and ground in that area. The new shaft was not hard enough (or something), and the bearing surface "went away" in just a few thousand miles. We were on vacation when the brake started dragging (because of the shaft being out of position), so it got the drum good and hot, then started leaking gear oil into the overheated drum.

Had a rather interesting time getting everyone out of the car (including my disabled son), then all our luggage, then trying to jack the car up so I could get under there to douse it with water. Don't know if the water did any good, but it did eventually go out without doing any lasting damage; just seconds before the fire department showed up. Pretty well ruined the vacation, not to mention the 3 week delay in getting back home.

Both shafts had been replaced at the same time, with the same brand of course; and the other side failed shortly afterwards (although not nearly so dramatic). Put in some genuine GM shafts (at over twice the price of the others) and no troubles since.
 
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I originally had some trepidation about poor materials/testing on the less expensive shafts but have since been pleasantly surprised. No early failures.
 
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axle*
 
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:ambivalence:
 
I'm turning into the grammar police or possibly just the spelling police, I just did the same thing on the "Were (sic) is the lug wrench?" post.
 
Same thing on the front axle inside CV joint boots on the Subaru. The heat of the engine and exhaust must really shorten their life.
 
pdplot said:
I had a couple of Audi Quattros. mechanics were always replacing the CV boots.
Click to expand...

These lasted 261k miles so I can’t complain. Replacing the axle myself cost $87 for the part and few hours of time. Probably would have cost 3 x that just to have dealer replace the boots.
 
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