First thing to check is the breather tube. It should be attached to the diff, and probably has a little plastic piece on the end.

It vents pressure as the rear axle lubricant heats up, and then allows air back in when it cools causing a vacum. If the end gets clogged, things like what your describing can happen.


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This thread might have info that helps Rear axle seal - PowerStrokeNation : Ford Powerstroke Diesel Forum

Rusty

 

could be the nut came loose that hold the yoke to the pinion shaft

 

But he's talking hubs and brake shoes, not pinion. Sounds more like a hub seal, not a pinion seal.

Rusty

 

Looks like a wasp (mud dauber) plugged the air vent tube on the differential/axle.

Bummer because now there's trash inside the the axle and maybe wear. I refilled the diff (which was drained to about the level of the axle) and took loose the axle and let it drain and what I caught I filtered through an 80 mesh filter and past a magnet and there's a small amount of fine metal in the gear oil.

The splines look fine but I wonder how I can get all the trash out of there. I need to clean out the bores.

Any ideas how to clean out this system?

 

Lots of solvent. You can use an air powered siphon gun, jack up one side at a time. Put a catch bucket at the hub end and spray away at the diff end. Gravity will carry it all out.


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I took a garden sprayer and pumped about 1.5 Gallons of Diesel through the offending axle and out the diff (cover off) about 10 times and was getting all kinds of trash in my catch pan that looked like pieces brake dust (non magnetic) even after 10 times. There's less of it in there but man did this turn into a big job all because of a wasp plugging the vent tube. The other axle looked ok for grime.

One thing that gets me though is that the axle seal lives in a very dirty environment (the brake drum). I don't know how these don't leak. I have just a single lip seal (not sure if that's how these are supposed to be) and I don't see how with all of that brake dust, it doesn't eventually break the seal.

 

When i replaced the seals in my 96 250 i read where alot of people suggest to replace the bearings and races along with the seals. I guess as the bearings wear and get play in them it causes the seals to fail again prematurely.

 

Cleaned the vent tube (plugged solid) and so far it seems to be ok!! Very happy about this! No seal change yet (with the existing NAPA seals). So it looks as if the plugged vent was the problem. This is in a E350 (Dana 60) but I believe the hub/spindle seal is the same as on other rear ends.