After i had my ball joints done the guys at a local shop left my dust seals hanging on the u joints. Ive gone round and round with this place trying to get my truck alighned and i still dont think its quite right but whatever. I dont want to take it back to them and be without my truck for a day to get these things back on. Does everything have to come apart or can i put those seals back on from the inside of the wheel? Thx

 

Those rings don't go inside anywhere, they are part of the outside of the knuckle seal. Once they fall off they can't be put back on. The good news is that they don't seem to serve much of any function, the knuckle seal works fine without them. If they were just hanging there I can't believe a shop wouldn't take the opportunity to replace them and charge you another $80 plus labor.

 

The shop should have put new seals in there when you had ball joints done. Since the axles have to come out, the dust seals should be replaced if they show too much signs of wear. Do you know if they even put in new axle seals that are inside the knuckle? I haven't yet pulled an axle without damaging those seals and requiring replacement.

 

I think they did replace the knuckle seal because im not leaking fluid out the pumpkin right?

 

seals in the knuckle don't keep diff fluid in. There are inner seals for that. The knuckle axle seals keep dirt/water out of the sealed bearings in your hub and are an intergal part of keeping the auto lock hubs working.

 

How can i check those seals, pull off the hubs i hope or do i need to pull the whole assembly out? Thx jeremy

 

My dust seals were broken and hanging on both sides when I took it apart to do the ball joints a couple of weeks ago. And here's something I didn't see on any of the write-ups about ball joint replacement: I believe that some lubrication is in order for the dust seals. Maybe they depend on slight leakage out of the axle tube, but I didn't want to take that chance. I put some grease on the surface they ride against.

 

I wondered about that too. I'm guessing the seal is designed to be sort of self lubricating and a wear item.

 

I don't know that it is designed to be self-lubricating, but they might have assumed that it would be used for short periods of time at low speeds. Or maybe they were depending on leakage from the axle to keep it wet.

Regardless, mine will be getting lubed whenever I lube the other chassis and steering parts.