the tail shaft bushing is worn. apparently this is a common issue.

I want to replace it myself as the dealer wants $300 for labour.

the books have zero information.

Any advice would be appreciated. any special tools needed??

thanks

I changed mine (AW70) about a year ago. The bushing was warn to about half thickness after 300k miles. Yes the gasket has to be scraped off and the case is pretty soft aluminum so be careful not to scratch the gasket surface. I used a 1" putty knife and some gasket remover.

The trans has to be drained so this might be a good time to replace the filter screen. Pan gasket (came off easy) and screen in kit from local auto parts was about $10 US. Put the car up on stands as high as you can. The trans cross member has to be removed so have a jack to hold up the trans. The tail can be dropped down a little for easier access but watch that the engine does not contact the fire wall at the head. Some fluid will still run out when you remove the tail so have an oil pan ready.

There is a square notch in the tail housing which the green manual says not to line up the hole in the bushing with. This notch is wide and deep so I used a hacksaw blade to split the bushing and it came out easily. One thing is that even the new bushing is not a close fit to the driveshaft flange. You can still wiggle the shaft after the installation.

Again, this may be a good time to replace U joints and center bearing.

IPD sells a kit for $28 which has the tailshaft bushing, the seal, and a new gasket. The bushing has to be pressed out and a new one pressed in. Maybe there is a machine shop which will do that for you. Try an automotive machine shop. I thought I remembered a tool which would do the bushing removal but I don't remember where I saw it. The $ 300 labor is high, sounds like they want to charge for removing the transmission. My parts sheet gives 1 hour to renew the seal (bushing replacement not mentioned) and 3.5 hr to R&R the tranny. They might have been planning to remove the tranny and replace all seals.

I'm about to do mine soon, my searching of the archives found 2 issues to be concerned about...

1. the gasket between the main tranny body and the extension housing (tailshaft) is usually left on the main tranny body side... scraping it off and cleaning that side up while it is on the car is the right thing to do but also a p.i.t.a.

some have suggested just leaving the old gasket on if it still looks good (what I hope to do) and perhaps adding a thin bead of gasket sealer.

2. Once the tailshaft is out .... pulling the bushing out and pressing in the new one takes either a special tool or some handiwork... check the archives for those details.

what has told you that your tailshaft bushing needs replaced? I'm still only very suspicious that mine needs replaced and I'd rather not deal with it without confirming that it does.

jack

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Bad Blue, '86 245, 258,000 mi., Columbus, Ohio

Others could probably answer this much better than I can, but i'll give it a shot:

One thing to look for when it's time to replace the bushing is a leaking extension housing seal. As the bushing wears, the driveshaft has more radial movement, which leads to the seal's demise. Another potential culprit is the center support bearing. If it needs to be replaced, it will result in a humming (ghost) noise that gets progressively louder with increased speed. For the same reason, the driveshaft has radial movement and can lead to seal failure (at both the extension housing and pinion bearing) as well as accelerated bushing wear.