Please help identify source of oil&grease radiation

Looks like you have a split in that CV boot. Pull on the folds and I'll bet you find it.

 

Yes, absolutely. They will also frequently fail where clamped (on any car). There's plenty of good repair advice on here.

 

yep mine did same thing

Porsche turbo boots about $10each on Pelican parts I have a post on this

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/mondial/441719-cv-boot-88-3-2-a.html

MY ADVICE
dont buy the claps instead repack your joints with boot on find your local axle shop and bring them to them as they have the clamp and correct equipment to tighten that clamp for extra $40

 

Look for the split first. There is a 1 in 100 chance it's from the last time it broke. Not likely but we can hope

 

Looks like old crud to me. I see nothing suspicious like cracking on the boot. And I should know since all four of mine are cracked. None of them has left crud like THAT though. I decided to buy four new CV joints pre-lubed, pre-booted etc. just for the heck of it. In fact I continue to drive the car as they are not making any noise.

That is stange crud though. Could it be ancient residue from a very slow oil seep of some sort. What is directly above? Even so, this is not the sort of thing that I would lose much sleep over.

 

Dave

It doesnt have to have an evident crack to have a split, if you move it at the clamp line it will show mystery split

there is a clearly defined spin pattern eminating around the cv boot area

maybe yours doesnt look this way cause you got no grease in your cv

it doesnt necessarilly make noise before burning the cv bearings and galling them

 

Bad form to replace without cleaning... its on the driver side so no burning smell from the exhaust but still to leave that grease on .....

 

Both outboard CVJ boots are entirely broken open and the inboard ones are cracked through. This all happened in the last 4,000 miles and was discovered while looking for my oil cooler leak. The cooler leak is dripping right onto one bad boot so likely has continuous lube . I have all four new ones on hand awaiting my local wrench. So I just motor on until I hear a noise. Which seems oddly reluctant to make itself know.

 

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Have you tried wiping the grease off first, then take the car out for a drive to see if any new grease has appeared? That would tell you if that's old grease or not.

 

This is a good suggestion for two reasons. First, it can establish if this is a an ongoing problem. Second, if the boots ARE throwing out grease there is the question if they need to be re-greased! I rather doubt it, but there is a substantial amount of crud. However, I do not believe I would go through all the trouble of dissasembly just for that.

Two of my boots have been entirely separated for perhaps 4,000 miles and there is no hint of noise. My off-road buddies seem rather convinced these joints would need to be fully immersed in muddy slime to ruin them. And these CV joints are not even used to steer the car. They just do not get a lot of strain on them.

 

the grease has already been spun out similar to Raps situation

the special clamp tool may help but Ive talked to a few mechanics and they recommend an axle specialist


Dave when and if it goes it typically due to unequal forces ....say cornering at top speed but hey if you want a squirley ass end in a curve at speed keep tempting fate I personally dont want to see you in a ditch or worse

 

Hi Braq, if you are doing it yourself........https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3o4LXtkdRw

 

I had spalling on 2 of the 4 and none of them got grit in them and they didn't go completely dry of grease. I put less than 100 miles on mine after I had one boot split fully. Others had surface cracks. To this day I don't understand why there was spalling in them. Maybe from sometime in the past? The grease was more runny than expected. It could have been oil from the differential had gotten in with my car.

 

OMG you are a glutton for punishment

its a lot easier to have the bolts on the bottom side

suggest borrow a jack from another vehicle and put your tires under the car for safety if you have no jackstands!

 

I reused my old bolts just make sure that they are not stripped or pita next time

I inspected my old joint bearings and found no scratches so cleaned them up and reused they only had about 4oK miles

as you can see the previous owner replaced the clamp that can be tightened conventionally

you can reuse those too

 

Braq, keep up the good work...this is actually part of the fun of ownership. You get to 'really' know these cars.

AND

once you fix something yourself - the sense of accomplishment on a job well done is priceless....