thai

Hi All,

I'm doing my gearbox and diff fluid change this weekend and got some crush washers from the dealer. Has anyone used the same crush washers for the diff in the gearbox when you do the fluid change?

Thai

takahashi

No we never do... we as in my mechanics doing and me watching....

thai

No worries. I like to get my hands dirty.

mdr

I changed me diff and tranny oil right after the Nats this year and reused mine.
Have not had a problem.

thai

Thanks MDR, did you have the front and back on jacks and equal level?

mdr

Yep I jacked it up, put it on jack stands and used a torpedo level along the bottom of the door frames to make sure it was level front to back.

Not that hard really if you have 4 jack stands of the same kind just measure them and make sure they are all at the same height before you drop the car on to them.

I jacked up the back set it up and then jacked up the front.

rotarenvy

my first oil change on the 8 I re-used the sump crush washer. It leaked very expensive since you effectively have to dump to oil to change it! $2 washer or $50 of oil?

they are made of aluminum or that's what my dealer sell me. one trick I used last time was to heat the hell out of the washer on a hot plate and let it cool. this anneals the aluminum and makes it soft again. no leaks this time

thai

My garage floor is dead straight from side to side and there is only a slight decline from front to back. I have 4 jack stands and a hydraulic jack so this will make work very simple.

My wife use a lot of the palmolive body wash which come in a pump container and work quite well with thick solution. I will use it as an oil pump by connecting a long tube to the snout.

thai

Yup, I will never reuse a crush washer again. My first oil change was on a 1992 honda civic and I reused the washer a couple of time and not knowing that it was a crush washer. It started to leak and I thought that I didn't tighten it enough and so I tried to tighten the nut with too much force and stripped the thread on the sump..... costly mistake.
Had too much rice for dinner.

rotarenvy

well you know the worst that can happen then!

crush washers are unpredictable things. my last car used the same one for 4 years wihtout a leak! that's why I reused the washer the first time I changed the oil on the 8. I wasn't prepared last oil change and decided to risk the washer but I think the heating (annealing) helped.

thai

Participate in the 48 hour famine before doing the oil change

thai

Completed the gear and diff oil change. This task was less messy then the engine oil change.
Once I had the car on jack stands the oil change was easy. I think the whole task took about 1.5 hours.