ok , heres what i did, i drained my front locking diff then to make sure i could fill it with gear oil i had the plastic qt .opened the fill plug and inserted the bottle
the red little cap was still on-- the plastic bottle was not open (i did this to see if i could fill with out making a mess)
well it would work , cool i thought, then i removed the unopened platic qt and the little red plastic cap got shoved of into the front diff crap i am wondering what will happen
will the little red cap just get eating up or could damage happen
any thought would be appreciated

 

Personally, if I couldn't fish it out with a bit of wire I'd open the diff up and remove it. Then again, it's a little piece of plastic and your diff is full of fast-moving metal, it could very well not interfere with anything and end up shredded to tiny bits that do nothing. At worst it could get stuck somewhere and prevent something from turning properly. It is not very likely to cause any damage but I'd remove it just because it's generally a good idea to not have any sort of foreign object in a diff. If you haven't poured the oil in, open up the diff and pull it out, else you can take your chances or replace the oil again.

 

well i dont have alot of experience with this but i would get that cap out before i drove it. If you drive it now i am sure it would chew the cap up but then theres gonna be little chunks of plastic in there and that sounds like a bad mix to me.

 

Ever have a front axle lock up when your driving? I have and even if it might get chewed up I'd take it out just to make me feel better.......because face-planting the steering wheel sucks

 

It's doubtful a little plastic cap will be able to cause any damage to anything in there, but you will have to decide how much risk you're comfortable with

Little pieces of tiny plastic floating around in there could get into the carrier or pinion bearings and prevent proper lubrication, and then you have a real problem.

 

try and flush it out with some cheap or used gear oil.

 

If you haven't driven it yet it should be floating on top.
Or maybe it will come out when you drain it.

 

rofl... forget about it... that will turn to mush in about 5 min of driving

 

no i have not driven it yet and i drained the gear oil and it didnt come out and its nots floating to the top

 

it may very well not be a problem. but i'd try and get it out. unfortunately it's a bit of a PITA but not as bad as it could be. unbolt the diff from the frame. leave it connected to the side axles and lower it down a bit using a jack to support it. unbolt the front cover and hopefully you will find it!

 

x2

There is too many things it could do bad v. there is nothing it will help.

 

i'd drive it and chew it up and then drain the diff. It's not going to hurt anything at all.

 

You might try and fish it out with vacuum; get some small diameter copper tubing that you can bend and see if you can't suck it out the drain hole or the fill hole.

Anyone you know have a boroscope?

Probably not that big of deal, but if it were my truck I would do whatever it took to get it out of there before I drove it.

 

I'd probably get it out myself. It won't become a potential problem till you put it in 4wd. So if you need it as a daily you can drive in 2wd with the hubs unlocked with no problem. I removed the front dif, front drive shaft, and tied the halfshafts up. Drove it for a couple days no issues. Its the beauty of locking front hub.

 

I like the idea of trying to flush it out. Fill and drain a couple times time to see if it comes out. If not, then try driving in 4WD to chew it up and drain.

 

is it an open diff or is there a locker in there? If its open.. maybe not such a big deal. However if there is a locker, do you want to get little chucks of plastic getting caught in the locker and posibly keep it from "locking"?

 

Seriously? A 1/8oz of plastic locking the axle of a 5000lbs truck?

It'll just get mashed into oblivion the first time it runs in between the ring and pinion. I wouldn't think twice about it. I wouldn't drain the diff afterwards either- what's plastic made from anyways... petroleum.

If it went into your automatic transmission, that would be a different story though as it could plug something up, maybe.

 

Good post Matt16

 

I would pull it down and get the sucker out.

The bits of plastic will be like dirt running around, it might stick to a gear tooth face and cause extra wear on one tooth or something, NOT good.
It may very well not do anything, but do you want to risk it?

You have 2 choices, do the work now or perhaps do the same work but have to buy a front diff later, your choice.

 

I didn't say that was gonna happen at all.......and don't think it would directly do anything like that but why take a chance.......it's like 10 bucks worth of oil compared to a potential bad situation. I just used it as an example and as someone else said in this thread it could get chewed up and block the oil in some way.........lack of oil could definitely cause failure and lead to said face plant.