Grease Spots on Rear Alloy=New CV Joint and Half Shaft

[Montana5]

Thought I would put this on here as it appears to be an unusual one, my independant Jaguar specialist reckons he has never seen the CV Joint go / leak on the S Type before and having searched several forums and 2 years of JEC Mags, I never did find any info on CV Joints.

It started with my washing mitt being contaminated by grease, I thought at first it must have been thrown up off the road onto the rear n/s wheel, however when it happened again I got suspicious.


Thought I'd solved it when I took a couple of pictures under the car, was convinced that a rubber bush/grommet was melting and dripping rubber onto the wheel.


However, and this is where having a ramp can make all the difference, after visiting my Independant specialist (Prestige Jaguar in Paisley) they had it up on the ramp and spotted right away that the CV Joint was leaking and throwing the grease up onto those rubber bushes, where it then dropped onto my nice clean alloy wheel.


Now apparantly on the S Type you can't change the CV Joint on its own, you have to buy a complete Half Shaft, so a quick call by my Technician to Jaguar Parts for a price and it was no shock to me when he said are you ready for this, I kind of expected it would be a sore one, £627.00 inc vat plus fitting...ouch. My mission was now to come up with a better price than that, it soon became clear the there were at least 3 different types and part numbers for S Type Left Side Half Shafts, I finally located a S/H one at Eurojag Spares, they arranged to remove it from another STR which they had in, price £110.00 inc vat and delivery, now we all like to have new parts fitted to our cars but this was a bit of a no brainer, next day it arrived as promised and with a 3 month guarantee.


This next picture shows the CV Joint and ABS Ring.


Booked another visit to Prestige Jaguar and had it fitted for the agreed price of £60.00, so far so good, done a couple of hundred miles and all is well

Doug.

[J44EAG]

Sorry to hear that, Doug.

Most unusual to have leaks of this nature unless the c.v boot is split either by damage, rubber rot or extreme old age.

I see nothing wrong with fitting selected serviceable second hand parts. It is an excellent way to save money. I would draw the line at brake discs, pads, hydraulic lines and in most instances, tyres. Similarly high mileage gearboxes and by that I would say that it would include transmissions that had covered more than about 30k miles. I would regard fitting a second hand gearbox with more mileage than that as a false economy.

The shaft you have been sent looks to be a good one. Even the splines are unworn which implies that the donor car left the factory with the hub nut tight!

I`m not surprised you found little on the internet regarding half shafts and c.v joints. They seem robust enough generally and are pretty much install and forget. I can recall a post on this BB some time back where the member had to replace a shaft for some reason, but that is the only instance I`ve heard of in the past six or seven years or so.

Mike

[oldtimer]

Doug, What a staggering price, that's sixty two weeks pocket money for me! What interests me were there any symptems associated with the loss of grease, like vibrations or judders? Would a new boot and a tube of CV joint grease have fixed it? When I looked at the CV Joints on mine I thought they are identical to my old GTi Metro. Now theres a thought. I'm sure if you sent the drive shaft to Mike he would love to examine it to determine if it is a joint failure or just a defective old boot?**!>
Oldtimer

[Montana5]

Hi Phil, I understand your logic and I was thinking that way too, having had loads of instances with previous FWD Cars replacing CV joints and Boots splitting, however there were no noises from the joint (though I probably wouldn't hear them anyway for the Exhaust) nor signs of any splits on the rubber boot, the grease seemed to be leaking from the cone side, which was very strange, hence the grease on the ABS Reluctor Ring, my Tech assured me that the joint would be on its way out, so best to replace.

Doug.

[Montana5]

Was speaking to my Technician today about the CV Joint and picked up a few snippets of info about this. As I had said previously the Rubber Boot was undamaged, the grease had escaped from the metal cone joint, which can be seen in the picture below of the new one, the two sections of the cone are pressed together at the manufacturing stage, he also said that the ABS Reluctor Ring was pressed on too and if that splits or is corroded, then the complete Half Shaft has to be replaced



Doug.

[naki]

Was speaking to my Technician today about the CV Joint and picked up a few snippets of info about this. As I had said previously the Rubber Boot was undamaged, the grease had escaped from the metal cone joint, which can be seen in the picture below of the new one, the two sections of the cone are pressed together at the manufacturing stage, he also said that the ABS Reluctor Ring was pressed on too and if that splits or is corroded, then the complete Half Shaft has to be replaced



Doug.

Would it not be possible to remove the hub, then slide a new ring other the outer end of the half shaft, rather than swapping the whole shaft?

[Montana5]

Would it not be possible to remove the hub, then slide a new ring other the outer end of the half shaft, rather than swapping the whole shaft?

No as my issue was not the Ring, it was that the steel Cone Joint cover was leaking Grease.

Doug.

[naki]

Ok, fair enough.