I don't have a lot of money to work with these days. If I were to stay with auto hubs, how would I go about taking them apart and cleaning? or replacing? if replacing, how much will that run me? and with the manual hubs, how would I go about doing that and how much does that cost? and how do manual hubs work with a system designed for auto hubs? I am mechanically minded and can usually figure things out pretty good but I have never had a 4x4 before and I would like to know what I am getting myself into before I start. I do believe the auto hubs are ok, they go in just fine when its warmer but when its colder out they seem to stick. I think they just need a good cleaning. I have yet to get a factory service manual and not sure how to go about cleaning the hubs. any schematics or direction would be awesome! Thanks, God Bless!
Wow, you ask a lot of questions. Let's take them one at a time.
Re: how would I go about taking them apart and cleaning?
The Explorer I'm familiar with is a '94 Eddie. On that one you just take off the front wheel and the hub (if not loose already) is held on with a couple flat steel retainer like the ones that hold brake drums on older cars. Remove those retainers and the hub should slide off. Now you are going to know right off if you're on to the problem if there is grease and gunk inside the hub. You don't really have to take them apart if you can flush all the grease and dirt out. If you can get next to a solvent tank it would be an easier job to complete, but then you need to be certain to get all the solvent out of the hub.
When Jr. & I did his '94 the temperature outside was in the single digits. We filled the hubs with ATF, automatic transmission fluid, and set them by the heater to warm up the grease that had infiltrated the hubs. Once we got all the grease and dirt out we gave them a final dip in the tranny fluid, shook out the excess, wiped off the excess grease from the axel stub and put them back together.
Hey, you're a Mopar guy, did you know that Mopar used ATF in their manual transmissions back in the late 70's and early 80's? That was where I got the idea to use it on the hubs. Back then I worked at a Chrysler - Plymouth - Dodge dealer as a line mechanic, I was shocked the first time I drained a three speed manual trans for overhaul and red stuff came pouring out.
Re: Replacing...
This is pretty easy too. All the instructions come with the conversion hubs. I did this to my F150, but now I'm wishing I had the automatic hubs back. I replaced the ones on the F150 before Jr. bought his '94 so when I got his fixed I found myself wishing I had kept all the parts from the truck because all they really needed was cleaned. Oh well.
Re: how do manual hubs work with a system designed for auto hubs?
Manual hubs are as they sound, manual. When you decide you need to use four wheel drive you get out of the truck and turn a knob in the center of the hub from 'free' to 'lock' this "turns on the hubs" or locks the wheel to the front axel. When you're done working or playing or just getting where you want to go you unlock or put the hubs in 'free' wheeling position. This doesn't change the operation of the four wheel drive from what it is now other than the added step of manually locking your front hubs.
Re: I have never had a 4x4 before
Don't worry, used ta be I couldn't even spell 4x4.
Until I moved to the farm almost ten years ago now, I had never owned one either. Now I have four. Gee, that's 16 wheel drive.... WooHoo!
Hope this helps.
