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Installing New CV-Axles


Nick
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CV Axle Replacement

 

Written by Piscator and OffroadX

Posted by Nick

 

Estimated Time: 1.5-4 Hours

 

 

Last May at the Nissan Net Run down in JROCC I discovered I had a blown CV boot, the joint was already thunking and clunking so there was no point n replacing it. I finished the weekend on it and started searching for a replacement. It was looking like I was going to have to spend at least $150 for the part when my friend and fellow Nissan owner OffroadX said he had a line on one on Ebay. He sniped the auction for me and I got the axle for $35 including shipping.

 

Looking in the Factory Service Manual and Chiltons/Haynes guides as well as Alldata I saw that the job, while not all that hard, was scheduled to take 3-4 hours. It did, the first time, the second time we did it in under and hour and a half.

 

I highly recommend having someone working with you as a helper. The job will go faster and be way more fun. Again, OffroadX came to my rescue and worked with me to get this job done.

 

Block the rear wheels and jack up the front of the vehicle and put it on stands, remove the wheel on the side in question. I suggest removing the wheel from the other side too tho you don't have too. Put the Transmission in neutral and the T-case in 4high....You'll need to slip from 2 to 4 high at different times to lock the driveshaft while accessing and loosening or tightening the CV/Diff bolts.

 

Remove the five bolts attaching the axle to the diff. NOTE these are 12 point bolts you *MUST* use a 12 point socket to remove them. An air wrench or air ratchet with a long extension makes things nice and easy. You're not going for high torque so I just used a regular 8" extension to reach in there. Be ready to use a strap wrench to turn the front driveshaft so the diff flange rotates to allow access to all the bolts.

 

Open up the 4wd hub and remove the snap ring holding the axle inside the wheel hub.

 

Disconnect the outer tie rod end from the front of the knuckle.

 

Remove the disk brake caliper and wire it up out of the way.

 

Carefully use a jack to lift and support the lower control arm, keeping an eye on the nearside jackstand to be safe. Unbolt the four bolts securing the upper A-Arm to the ball joint and wire it up out of the way too.

 

 

 

Use your hand to turn the steering knuckle to the right as far as it'll go (for removing drivers axle, turn left to remove the passenger side axle) and rotate the wheel hub out and down towards the front. Work the axle out along the frame towards the rear. At this point you will likely end up determining the shock has to be removed as well, do so if required. There is only about half an inch of clearance but there IS room to wriggle it out. Use a jack to raise or lower the lower control arm and wheel hub if needed.

 

Make sure that the spacer came out with the old axle, it’s a copper alloy washer about an eighth of an inch thick that goes over the outer end of the shaft and rides against the back of the wheel hub. If you leave it in there and your replacement axle has one on it too, you won't be able to get the snap ring on and you'll have to uninstall it and start over (mind you'll be able to slip it out and back in about an hour this time :) If your replacement axle is used and has one on it already, stick with the one that came with the replacement. Otherwise, re-use the one that came off your old axle, it shouldn’t be too thick to prevent the snap ring from going back into place.

 

Grease the splined axle shaft and slip the replacement axle in the same way the old one came out.

 

Bolt the inside end to the diff with the five 12 point bolts, Install the snap ring in the hub and replace the hub cover (for Manual hubs Autos require more doing)

 

Replace the tie rod end, be sure to use a new cotter pin. Replace the shock if it was removed earlier.

 

Lower and bolt the upper A-Arm to the upper ball joint.

 

Replace the caliper.

 

Test the 4wd action making sure everything turns OK.

 

Replace the wheels, lower the wagon and test drive. Have a beer, you just saved $400 which you can now spend on other mods.

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  • 5 months later...
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Guest philipfrank

is this the way it is for a 95? mine has blown the boots on both sides and the wife is still driving it. i heard it was a nightmare to do this, but by reading this it seems do-able. i'm an ex-aircraft mech so i'm good with a wrench and don't mind getting my hands dirty. please let me know if i will run into any other problems.

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  • 4 months later...

My Pathy is doing some clunks when going over bumps or bad pavemented streets... Last weekend I replaced the stabilizer bushings on the clamps 'cause I saw one was badly rooten... while doing this, I saw that my driver's side outer CV boot was blown. Replacing the stab bushings didn't stopped the clunks, just a little bit.

 

Do replacing the CV boot can stop the clunks... or maybe?

 

Or... maybe I'll have to replace the CV axle?

 

And did any of you have ever used this outer CV zip boot ?

 

 

Fernando

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:takebow:

 

Now it's ok!

 

Yesterday I left it to the mech, he replaced the boot and discovered that the noise was caused by a little looseness in the passenger's front axle, and fixed it easily.

I spent less than US$ 30 :D

 

 

 

Thanks!

 

(living and learning)

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  • 1 year later...

nope, all you need is some sockets, pair of pliers.. you'll need the 12 sided kind of socket for the bolts that attach the cv to the t case (14mm?) BFH, vice, breaker bar.. jack & stands. and a set of torx.. some grease to regrease the running hubs.

 

may wanna check the bearings, (you'll need the inner seal) and check all of your steering comonents while you're there.. i think i ended up throwing some new bj on there while i was doing this...

 

good luck

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Can anyone tell me the easiest way to rotate the diff flange? I've removed 4 of the 6 12 sided bolts, but untill I rotate the flange I can't access the last two.

 

I've got the tranny in N and the TC in 4HI -- do I need to change this? Do I need to go pick up a strap wrench?

 

thanks guys -- so far so good with this I guess -- only one bloody knucle too! (thank jeebus for gloves!)

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Yeah, CV's should spin either direction with the t-case in 2WD (and if you have manual hubs, they should be unlocked). Basically when it's in 2WD, the front diff is in Neutral unless the hubs are locked, which would just spin the front diff and driveshaft as you drive and add to the drivetrain drag.

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  • 4 months later...
Guest Palmer

Both my front left and right cv boots are cracked along with the upper and lower ball joints look pretty bad. I'm going to work on the left side one weekend and the right side the next weekend. What's a good online source that you guys use to purchase Pathfinder parts? I've got a few good spots for parts for my Z car but they are lacking these pathy parts...If you can't post the site, just PM me.

 

Thanks

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If you're just replacing boots, pull the axle, get a new boot and reinstall it with new grease. Costs you time, effort and about $12. You can get replacement CV boots from most parts stores. Just don't get the universal boots with the snaps/zipties...those are bad.

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so my boot is extremely ripped, and the joint is blown up. i took off the wheel and was trying to un bolt the 12 point bolts, but everytime id go to reef on them the axle would turn, 2wd or 4wd.

 

both tires were removed, if i left the other side on and on the ground, would that let the axle lock in 4wd so it wouldnt turn? also i have suto hubs, could these be a factor?

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  • 4 months later...
Guest SuperSon

How can you tell if the automatic hubs are locked ?

 

Another question is if the green indicator lights are on in the dash does that mean im on 2hi?

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  • 1 month later...

The light on the dash is just a reference type light. If your 4wd shifter is working properly and is in the top 2wd position you ARE in 2wd no matter what that light says.

Edited by TrailChaser
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I just finished changing my passenger side cv. It took me 2hrs to do it 95% by myself.

 

Just a couple of side notes to speed up the job for anyone about to change one out.

First, there is no need to remove any part of the brakes. Leave the calipers alone they are not in the way.

Second, for those of us that are fortunate enough to have installed the manual locking hubs. Have a second person hold the brake pedal(this is where the 5% from the other person is needed) while you break the drive flange bolts loose and again when you torque them back down. It's MUCH better than dealing with the slack in the drive train when switching back and forth from 2wd to 4wd.

 

Hope this helps someone else in the future. :beer:

 

David

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  • 9 months later...

The Haynes manual and the Nissan shop manual talk about selecting new snap rings of the correct thickness and using a dial indicator etc etc. Any need for this or is it OK just to put on the new axle with the old snap rings and not worry about it. I didn't want to go to the parts desk and buy like 6 different snap rings at $8 canadian a shot just in case I needed one.

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All it does is ensures you won't get ANY play in the CV, allowing mud/water in the inner bearing seal. It's important, but as 88 said, I've reused the same snap rings any time I've had these things apart, and have had no issues.

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OK. We got everything off and the new axle in on one side no problems.

But when it came to re-assembling the auto hub the groove for the snap ring wasn't quite out far enough to get the old ring on. The splined washer and clutch plates weren't pushing back far enough or the end of the axle wasn't sticking out far enough.

Ended up busting the splined washer into fragments trying to get the snap ring on. :ohno01:

So now I've only got 3 wheel drive.

 

Any ideas why the end of the axle wasn't sticking out far enough? These were brand new axles so maybe there wasn't really a problem just that I should have got a bunch of new snap rings of different thickness that would have fit.

 

Oh well, looks like I'm ordering manual hubs. I hear the Milemarker is pretty good. But no wheeling this weekend, only as a passenger if I can get a free seat :(

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  • 3 months later...

Okay, I am replacing the front axles on a 4wd 95 pathfinder, and it's not going well. This isn't my car, but I'm a reasonably competent mechanic, being familiar with cars I'd say were more complicated (Saabs, VWs...)

 

First off, the car won't go into 4H or any of the 4wd positions , so I couldn't use THAT method to lock the axles from turning. I don't know why it won't go into any of the 4wd positions that are forward of "N", but it won't.. It still goes into 4L just fine (whatever position is one backward from N). Yes, I have the auto trans set to "N" as well.

 

I don't know if I have manual hubs or automatic hubs, but I figured that manual ones would be the kind that you turn to lock- These ones were held on by like 6 allen head bolts..

 

So, removing the cover (to get to the snap ring), and out comes a spring and some random unidentifiable bits that I have a strong feeling weren't supposed to come out in several parts. I put them all together back in a way that SEEMS logical, and voila! the hubs are now locked with the brake disk, so I'm able to have someone in the car hold the brake down, so I at least was able to get the 5 axle to tranny bolts out.

 

I skipped the tie rod end for the moment, since I'm without the proper fork- shaped tool to remove it, and proceed to the upper ball joint mount. So all four of the bolts snap right off, and yet the ball joint is rusted solid to the upper A arm. Having snapped off the four bolts- should this thing just seperate with no effort- I even wedged something between the frame and the upper A arm- in order to have the weight of the whole hub/rotor/brake assembly seperate things, but still stuck solid.

 

Just a note about my handle "rustbucket"- This car is my girlfriend's.. I'm not a pathfinder person, not even an SUV person. This car is pretty rusty, butruns and drives ok, and only needs to last us another year or so. I gotta say, the Japanese are second to only the Italians when it comes to lack of rustproofing. Just painting all the suspension parts black is not good enough protection against salt up in the northeast US. I know I'm in for more frozen bolts, bloody knuckles and sheared off bolts. I expect this sort of thing with 30 year old cars, but something that's 13- seems too young to be so rusty.

 

Right now I'm waiting overnight for everything to soak in penetrating oil, but not sure how I'm going to get the upper ball joint un-glued from the A-arm.. If I cant, - is there a workaround? Like maybe removing the other end of the upper A arm from the car? Either way I'm going to have to drill and re-tap the upper ball joint holes and get some new bolts in there. No, I don't feel like replacing a new upper ball joint, since it's not all that worn out. Heh- maybe the only way to seperate it from the A-arm is to drive on it for a while. (like that's safe!).

 

To be honest, we just need to have this thing pass inspection, which it won't with torn axle boots. If it were up to me, I'd just remove the worn front axles and leave them out, and never use the 4wd again (which since I can't get the shift lever into 4H, maybe that doesn't work) I know you guys are all Pathfinder enthusiasts, but would the car work fine in 2wd with no front axles? - or if the worn ones were left in, would they only get used (or only turn) when the car is in 4wd mode?

 

And are those auto hubs supposed to fall apart when you remove the cover? When I take the hub cover off the other side, I'm going to take better note at how the guts go together, and maybe that will solve things. Like I said, I don't care too much if the 4wd works or not. I doubt this thing is going to make it to next winter to even need 4wd again.

 

-Rusty

Edited by rustypathfinder
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