So, after 'wheeling Molly's truck today while she was at work ... she came home and noticed a puddle under the rear diff. Go out to find the drain plug loose - no biggie, put in the spare, right?

Yeah, ummm , no.

The threads are all boogered, and need to be chased/tapped. Anyone know what the thread size is? Anyone in Denver/Fort Collins have a tap that size?

 

They seem to measure M18x1.50. Best option is to weld the old plug in there and call it good.

 

They are indeed m18x1.50 and are the same as an 02 sensor thread, or an m18 sparkplug thread. A thread chaser from Snap-On/Bluepoint is around $6 but won't repair really buggered up threads. For that you'd need a tap, which runs around $20 and will allow you to cut new threads.

You can also get thread chasers for m18 sparkplugs at any parts store. Normal sparkplugs are m14 so you need the thread chasing tool with the bigger thread size.



New allen-head drainplugs from the dealership are around $5. Ask for a camry auto trans drainplug, they often have these things in stock.

HTH.

 

Fantastic - thanks for the help guys!

 

A local tool shop had a M18-1.5 tap in stock, got home, tapped the threads (they were so boogered that it cut like it had never been threaded before - chasing them would absolutely not haveworked!) and installed the new drain plug with blue loctite no problem!