Diff Gone

East Lothian Freelander · Oct 17, 2011

My TD4 2003 was on for a service and MOT last week.

2 new tyres were fitted to the front - it was my local independent who has been excellent.
Had the debate about putting the tyres on the back - he said it wasn't required and they would be fine on the front.
First real run with it today - higher pitched than normal road noise - put it done to new tyres.
First stop though, strong smell of oil and smoke coming out the drivers rear wheel arch.
Have been recovered to a local garage - they are looking at it at the moment, but reckon the diff has gone.
Could it be connected to the tyres?

Fur Trapper · Oct 17, 2011

East Lothian Freelander said:
My TD4 2003 was on for a service and MOT last week.

2 new tyres were fitted to the front - it was my local independent who has been excellent.
Had the debate about putting the tyres on the back - he said it wasn't required and they would be fine on the front.
First real run with it today - higher pitched than normal road noise - put it done to new tyres.
First stop though, strong smell of oil and smoke coming out the drivers rear wheel arch.
Have been recovered to a local garage - they are looking at it at the moment, but reckon the diff has gone.
Could it be connected to the tyres?

Yes

Singvogel · Oct 17, 2011

Most unlikely that the diff has gone already, if you only drove a short distance.
Put the new tyres on the back as everyone including LR says to do, clean up the thrown out oil, top up the rear diff, and keep your fingers crossed.
My bet is the oil has overheated and been frothed up.
I put 235/55-17 tyres on the back to drive home - approx 20 miles, and that was a bit too much - I know now I shouldn't have done it - but I was lucky.
Good luck - don't let them change the diff until you have tried it again with the oil topped up and the new tyres on the back.

bdd · Oct 17, 2011

Doesn't sound good....what East Lothian garage was it - pm me if you do not wish to post.

Hippo · Oct 17, 2011

Make sure you go back to the nob who fitted yer tyres un tell him we want a word wiv im.

Oh, un name im too.

East Lothian Freelander · Oct 17, 2011

I was going to send him the link to this thread - maybe not now ;-)
I'm pretty stuck now. We took two cars on the road to Aviemore, but now the Freebie has had to be recovered back home - I needed two cars because I'm meeting up with folk who are arriving by train later this week.
I only got the Freebie back from the garage last Thursday, but couldn't find the time to swap the tyres from front to back - that'll teach me !

joe27979 · Oct 17, 2011

deffo tyres will have screwed your diff mate!

Vissie · Oct 18, 2011

I disagree!

You're diff might be bollocks, they aint great diffs tbh, but if you've only done very limited mileage since tyre swap. Then i really doubt it blew your diff up that fast, especially if you recon it wasnt noisey before.

Possibly a case of **** luck?

Hippo · Oct 18, 2011

Thing is we get a lot of peeps come on ere with mixed tyres un damage to the transmission. Could be the straw and camel effect but it seems too common a problem these days.

Fur Trapper · Oct 18, 2011

Vissie said:
I disagree!

You're diff might be bollocks, they aint great diffs tbh, but if you've only done very limited mileage since tyre swap. Then i really doubt it blew your diff up that fast, especially if you recon it wasnt noisey before.

Possibly a case of **** luck?

Pal think you is wrong on this

Hippo is the man of knowledge for gaylanders his skills should never be doubted

And you should ask him for frogiveness

Vissie · Oct 19, 2011

Putting the new tyres on the front can make it noisey, but boiling a diff makes it sound like it was screwed before. Especially when he states that it was whining on the first real drive after the tyre swap.

I've seen problems with diffs caused by different speed rated tyres of the same size and wear, but 1 run in a car wont boil a perfectly decent diff in my opinion. Its always an over time effect.

PS . Thanks for the tip. I've mailed Overlord Hippo some red roses as i hear they compliment his eyes....

Hippo · Oct 19, 2011

We could be veering off topic on this one but…

The big problem Freelander owners seem to have (other than durdy tratterers) is new tyres on the front only, with part worn on the rear. This puts additional strain on the transmission. Putting new on the rear with part worn on the front is said to be betterer. Reason being this has a potential cancelling effect of the off set of front wheels turning faster than the rears. The opposite would be new on the front and part worn on the rear, increasing the front to rear wheel difference = more stress in the transmission.

Now for ird’s and rear diff’s to physically break, the vcu would need to seize, or “activate” due to the sheering effect in order to pass substantially more power to the rear wheels than it normally would, say on tarmac roads. This would be caused by the front to rear wheel size biasing, or because the vcu is feked or near to being feked already. Under this condition I could accept a tooth, cog or case breaking due to physical strain. But this is different to the OP’s initial post. He said smoke from the drivers wheel arch. This was assumed to be from the rear diff breather, which would make us assume it was boiling in order to create the smoke.

Now this is the bit I can’t understand. Why would the rear diff boil? Naturally it would be due to excess heat, which it couldn’t dissipate via oil and convection. The cause of this would be mechanical movement inside. I think we can agree the rear diff would have been under more stress due to the tyres. But I can’t see why that would create excess heat other than parts inside moving against each other under more stress due to the additional transmission stress caused by the tyre change. Would that have been the case on this occasion? Or was the tyre change the straw that broke the Freelanders rear diff?

Oh, un thanks fer the flowers. I always think the plastic ones are betterer as you can put em in the washing machine each month to keep em looking fresh.

angeloc · Oct 22, 2011

What if a rear bearing or rear brake was dragging as well? Extra drive to the back because of Tyres compounded by drag would make the diff over work surely?

Just a thought.

Hippo · Oct 22, 2011

Could it be the diff had some water in it? Condensation boiling orf?

austen · Oct 23, 2011

Not been on here for ages but read this and had to reply. I have seen a brand new rear diff overheat and pop within 10 miles of being fitted, and thats with a new IRD and VCU. It was all caused by larger tyres at the front. The extra heat caused by the excess strain caused by the VCU having to slip more and the resulting stiffening up of the vcu was enough to overheat the rear diff oil and blow out the breather, making a horrible mess and gas smell, as well as popping the driveshafts out of the diff at the same time!! We have had several cars coe in with smashed up IRD's and rear diffs after garages have fitted new tyres at the front.

East Lothian Freelander · Oct 27, 2011

So here's the update.

Freebie recovered to the garage who had fitted tyres.
Based on some of the excellent advice on here, I asked for the tyres to be swapped - front to back, and for the diff to be topped up with oil.

There was no outward sign of damage to the diff.

After getting the car back, there was still a smell of diff oil - thought it may have been residue from the first flare up, so cleaned everything up, however, smell still there and now there are a few spots of fresh oil appearing on the driveway from the diff.

Car is going in to have the diff replaced, however, my concern is that we may be fixing the effect ( the diff flaring up) as oppoossed to the cause ( VCU?). Any thoughts?

angeloc · Oct 27, 2011

The common advice is always change the VCU if doing a diff it's false economy not to do so.

East Lothian Freelander · Oct 27, 2011

angeloc said:
The common advice is always change the VCU if doing a diff it's false economy not to do so.

Yeah - I was afraid of that, just read the symptoms section of the bell engineering website.

Fur Trapper · Oct 27, 2011

East Lothian Freelander said:
Yeah - I was afraid of that, just read the symptoms section of the bell engineering website.

That is good you did some search like that and found the right choice of repairs

angeloc · Oct 27, 2011

Austen at Bell does talk a lot of sense to be honest - its a bad design by Land-rover in one sense but not in another - When it's right it's right but boy if it goes wrong do you know about it - as you live with the vehicle you get to sense things before they become a problem and do save expense long term. I still think they are the best but second hand and are a great all round vehicle.

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