Great news!!!

 

Perfect! Thank you, I will go to them for the kit. I am pretty sure this is my issue.

 

if you surf back through my build thread "Akwheeler's 95 4runner SAS" you will see pictures of the rear wheel bearing tools I made, might be something you could cobble up. Sorry, I haven't figured out how to attach a link.

 

Good info, I will definitely take a look when I get to doing the job.

One question for those more experienced: Should I consider the possibility of a bent axle? One gentleman in the shop said it looked like my wheel had some wobble to it when I had it on the lift and in drive...could this also just be a symptom of a bad bearing or is the possibility of a bent axle now in the picture? I'm leaning toward bad bearing, given the other symptoms. Just didn't know if anyone else has any experience with this.

 

Since it is being held in the diff, if it wobbles both the diff AND the outer wheel bearing need to be "really" bad. On a new bearing, you will have almost the play that we see in the vids above. It is not relevant because there are two bearings in the system.

Pull the axles. It's a 10 minute job. 8 bolts, 2 pins (ebrake) and 2 brake lines. Ok 15m, ya have to remove the rims.

 

There is drive train shop not far from me that rebuilds rear ends, balances drive shafts, and etc.. They balanced the drive shaft on my 92 Pickup, and installed u-joints that I supplied for $55 out the door.

When my truck needs new rear wheel bearings/seals, I will pull the axles, and take them to their shop, and let them remove the bearings. Don't think my old body can handle all that beating and banging.

The Marlin Crawler full set is expensive. Has anybody used all Timken bearings and seals?

Don't see the large o-ring rubber seal in the Timken catalog. What does Toyota call it?

 

Okay, to clarify what you're saying: you're saying I should replace/balance the axles? I'm not opposed since I'll already be in there pulling the bearing. Thank you for the help!

 

The Marline Crawler set looks like the best deal I've seen so far, especially given they're using mostly Japanese made bearings and seals. I think one set is around 65 bucks?

 

Must have been looking at the wrong thing at Marlin. $69 a set is OK with me.

 

To have thejm checked for "trueness", I was thinking.

 

Well, I replaced the rear wheel bearings and got a rebuilt rear third member from East Coast Gear Supply. Really happy with the product and they had great customer service.

The driver's side rear wheel bearing was the source of the clunk sound. When I pulled the bearing and tried to turn it by hand, it was binding at one spot in the 360 degree rotation. It also had a generally coarse and gritty sound when turning by hand.

New question though: I installed the new diff, new bearings, and everything sounds good...until I hit about 45mph. At about 45, I start to get a rear end vibration. Any ideas what it could be? It was not there before, so I know it's something in the rear. Not the diff, not wheel bearings, so right now I'm thinking U-joints, out of balance wheel?

 

you're on the right track, maybe a wheel weight came off.
get going 50-55 when it is vibrating and kick it into neutral, if the vibration stops right away or changes significantly it is probably the u-joints.
it's easy to wiggle your driveshaft with the wheels blocked and the truck in neutral to check for play in the joints,
by any chance when you did the rear diff work did you pull the rear driveshaft apart at the slip joint?

 

I made sure to keep the driveshaft connected when I was doing the diff. I bungee corded the shaft the the frame where it wouldn't slip apart. Tomorrow I'll do some more testing and try to pinpoint the issue. Thanks for the quick reply!

 

Got it up to speed and then went into neutral and the vibration is still there. I want to say it's an out of balance wheel/tire but I can't seem to reason why the issue would surface immediately after doing the rear wheel bearings and diff...I can't make sense of it.

 

Most likely a wheel weight fell off like I said.
could be that some dirt or something kept one brake drum from fully seating on the axle, could be the axle was bent when the bearings were pressed on, lots of "could be"s
jack up the rear end with the truck in 2wd and let it idle in gear while you watch the wheels/tires for signs of wobble.
Or go have your tires/wheels balanced and see where you are at.

 

I think I'll get the tires/wheels balanced first. The axles didn't go in a press when I installed the new bearings so I'll put that pretty far down my list I think but if it comes to that I'll do that test.

 

So I had the wheels balanced and there was little to no improvement in the vibrations (though the tech said the wheels were significantly out of balance). Let me know what you think of this theory: When I pulled the old differential and turned the pinion gear by hand, the old diff turned very easily (due to wear and loosened tolerences). When I got the new diff, I turned it by hand and it took considerably more force to turn. Is it possible that because I swapped the old diff for the new diff, the U-joints are now revealing play due to the increased force required to turn the pinion gear?

This may be a stupid theory but I'm trying to reason through it. The vibrations occur from 45mph and up and also on deceleration. It seems that I can detect a slight, temporary increase in the sound of the vibrations when I accelerate while the truck is decelerating, but then the vibrations normalize.

 

pull the rear driveshaft at the transmission and check for play at your rear output shaft on the transmission

 

I will take a good look at the driveline components (U joints, center bearing, etc). What might indicate to look specifically at the rear output shaft? Just trying to learn. Thank you