Dennis, Thanks for your reply. I definitely have some radial play, I may
have to live with some leaking for now. I have checked two other automatics
and they both have radial play and leak. What needs to be replaced to fix
the radial play? What does it take to check/clean the breather, the cap on
the breather turns freely?

Thanks,

Ray

On Sat, Nov 17, 2012 at 11:13 AM, Dennis Haynes <d23haynes57@hotmail.com>wrote:

> You have "brass" flakes in the final drive? For the o-rings on the final
> drive bearing carriers to leak they most likely were damaged upon
> installation or at some point things had to overheat real bad for these
> rings to fail later. For the output flanges it is normal for there to be
> some axial (in-out) play. There should be no noticeable radial (circular)
> play. It there is the seal doesn't have much of a chance. Most axle leaks
> on
> these are due to overfilling or the breather(s) being blocked. As things
> heat up if the pressure can't get out the oil is going past the seals.
>
> Dennis
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
> Ray Brubaker
> Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2012 10:14 PM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: Re: '89 auto trans final drive questions
>
> Thanks for the replies. With the sump off it was clear that the main
> bearing
> were still tight, it is the flange attached to its drive gear that has
> play.
> The oil was pretty clean with only a small amount of brass flakes and a
> little fuzz on the magnet so I think it will run a while yet.
>
> I changed the flange seal on one side, drove it today, and checked to find
> that it is leaking about the same on that side. Is it likely that this leak
> is from the oring sealing the bearing support? Has anyone succeeded in
> sealing this from the outside with some type of sealant instead of taking
> it
> apart to change the oring?
>
> Thanks for any help,
>
> Ray
>
> On Wed, Nov 7, 2012 at 4:26 PM, Scott Daniel - Turbovans <
> scottdaniel@turbovans.com> wrote:
>
> >  Hi Ray,
> > I don't see that anyone has aaddressed your post yet...
> >
> > in my experience ..it's not the side bearings ..
> > it's the output flange being loose on the splined shaft it sits on.
> >
> > in two cases I just tried  another less-worn output flange and that
> > took care of it.
> > My recommendation is never touch the side bearings adjustment.
> >   - maybe if you knew it was in really bad shape there and were just
> > trying to get a few more miles .
> > but otherwise..
> > that's a critical adjustment.  It affects ring gear left-right
> > position and gear contact pattern on the pinion gear, and preload
> > there too.  So no-touchey ever in my book, unless you are doing a
> > whole set up on the R & P and you really know what you are doing.
> >
> > 80 W 90 GL-5 sounds good to me for the final drive section.
> > I wouldn't use the MT-90 there. ..it's a GL-4 for syncronizers .
> >
> > Scott
> > www.turbovans.com
> >
> >
> >  On 11/6/2012 7:26 PM, Ray Brubaker wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm putting a '89 auto trans Wolfsburg back on the road. I am planning
> > to change the drive shaft seals for leakage and noticed that there is
> > a noticable amount of side and end play in the out put flange.Is this
> > normal or is this from some wear in the diff bearings? I am going to
> > pull the pan to change the oil and see inside and can check better if
> > these bearing are loose. If there is some looseness but no significant
> > metal in the oil should I tighten them up by adjusting both sides
> > equally? Is there something else that would cause this looseness?
> >
> > The Bentley calls for SAE90 oil for the final drive, what is the
> > current recommendation to use here? Is an 80W-90 GL-5 good. I have
> > some Redline
> > MT-90 that I probably bought around '06, would this be a good choice?
> >
> > I didn't find anything in the archives on these subjects, but maybe I
> > didn't search right.
> >
> > Thanks for any input,
> >
> > Ray
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>