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sealing Impreza rear differential

Featured Replies

I have someone that wants this differential (finally)

 

 

I told him it needed a new gasket because the cover had been removed and it was shot, and he said that his current differential had a leak and his mechanic said it was about 390 to remove the rear differential, replace seals and put back on, but it would be about 200 to remove the rear differential and put a new one on, so he was hoping this one was already sealed.

 

I told him Id use some RTV and seal it up for him before he bought it... so I cleaned it up:

differential.jpg

 

My question.. How should I RTV it?

 

Should I do the red path? Red and Blue path? You can save the picture above and paint on it (obviously not easy to just draw it lol)

 

differential2.jpg

i would do the red and blue. i don't think you can do too much. this is one case where a glob of rtv inside should not be a problem.

 

am i wrong?

The more RTV the better. If any breaks off the gears will just chew it up into tiny bits. Just don't break the bolt heads off when you go to put the cover on. I happened to do that on my Durango's trans pan . DOH!!:eek:

  • Author

There does appear to be some dust in the differential, should I use brake cleaner or something on the inside and try to clean it up? Or just leave it because it shouldnt be enough to screw the diff up?

Well if you or the guy your selling it to is planning on using for drag racing the dust could make the car weigh .00002 oz more which could make the car lose a race. :lol: nah a little dust will never hurt the gears but to make it more sellable I would go ahead and shine it up.

Make a nice even layer of RTV all the way around the mating surface. If you get it on the screw holes it isn't going to hurt anything.

I let the RTV get a little tacky, the assemble.

 

What kind of dust? Like the dust that's ambient in the air? Or some metallic dust that's actually going to cause harm? If you have a few particles of dust it isn't going to hurt anything.... Seal it up and call it good.

 

 

But $200 to R&R a subaru diff?! :eek:

Is this a dealer?

With a lift, tranny jack, air tools, etc. It shouldn't take more than an hour. Find a new shop...

And they were going to charge essentially $190 to reseal the back cover? My god, how long does that take? Pull a few bolts out, seal it up, put it back together.

  • Author

Thanks :) I will grab some ultra gray RTV today then :)

 

 

I have no clue where he is going. They might be servicing it, the cost of redline could have been in there as well, he might be having other stuff done, he just told me it was way cheaper to buy a differential that didnt need sealing then to pull his out and reseal it.

I can't imagine 1qt of gear oil is running prices up so high...

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