I don't trust Subaru mechanics to work on mine, much less a Ford mechanic.

Causal relationship ? ... It was the wrong part ... doesn't get more causal than that. Kinda like them giving you running shoes two sizes too small then saying " we don't know why your feet hurt ... they must have hurt before we gave you the shoes"

So, a CV axle is comprised of balls that ride in an exterior housing on both ends. The balls ride in slots that allow the shaft to move in and out as well as rotate.

If the CV axle is too short, it will cause the interior housing to pull outward on the stub shaft that goes in to the transaxle and engages the drive gear. This can cause improper gear meshing and seal failure. The outboard side is bolted through the steering knuckle so while that joint would be under stress, once the joint is fully extended, there is no more give.

If the CV axle is too long, the movement of the suspension can cause the joint to exert pressure both on the trans stub axle [pushing it toward the trans and doing similar to the above but the opposite way ... gear is forced further in the trans] and, pushing out on the steering knuckle which can damage the wheel bearings, steering knuckle, strut as well as the axle itself.

In short, yes, the wrong CV axle could wreak havoc on the transmission as well as the steering knuckle and strut assembly.

Knowing what part they installed [part #] would be extremely helpful if this goes to litigation, an independent expert could then tell exactly what the cause of failure was [too long/short, bad spline engagement, outboard drive axle length incorrect etc].

Now, did they tell you it was "ok" to drive home then back ?

Or did they recommend against it ? Did you sign any release of liability forms ?

Good luck

 

The service centers never seem to say what's actually wrong, only what they want to replace.

If this is going to go to litigation, or even just be negotiated/arbitrated with the first dealer, someone will have to determine and explain exactly what is wrong/damaged before a causal relationship argument can be presented. We're in sort of the same situation.

So are we assuming that the normally open front differential is permanently locked due to internal damage from the wrong axles, causing binding on turns? Did the second dealer (Subaru) provide more explanation?

 

Every time I go back in after they call me they tell me it is ready to go. The first time (with the wrong part) they just gave it to my wife. There is a trail of fluid leaving their parking lot. She said they acted suspiciously when she picked it up.
The owner's brother went ashen when we came back in the first time. Impressive to happen as he is black.
The second time when they replaced the axles with a different set and replaced the hubs because they had been destroyed they gave it to us as fixed. We picked it up right at closing so were forced to drive it home and back. We live about 11 miles away.
They checked it a third time with a called in expert and said, "They are installed structurally sound.) and suggested that it might be a sensor problem and we could take it to a Subaru dealer to have the computer checked out. Sensor problem being it being told to engage the rear wheels full time. That dealer is about 80 miles away.
It's like. "Here it is, see if you will accept this..."
Now it is back there in their hands.

 

The Subaru dealer said it is the center differential transfer clutches that are binding.

 

Makes me sick when I hear stories like this.

Do you have parts numbers listed on the work order they gave you after paying?

List them here with the year and model of your car. The wrong parts may even be documented on the work order which case get a lawyer to write a nasty gram and chances are you will get an all new transmission via the subaru dealer with Ford paying for it.

Number one rule with town CV joints a good shop will clean them out and check to see if you need a new drive line or if all it really needs is cleaning and a new boot. Keeping the original drive lines is always far far better than replacement given replacements even with the correct size drive line can cause problems with vibration and such if the drive line is too stiff or flawed etc. The wrong drive line can obviously damage far far more expensive parts turning a very simple fix into a nightmare.

Start checking around to see if you know a lawyer or have friends that do - a nasty gram can be a very powerful tool to get things happening quickly and in your favor especially when something was so blatant as what has happened to your car.

 

The Subaru dealer said it is the center differential transfer clutches that are binding.

If the clutch plates are fully engaged when turning, that would cause binding ("torque bind").

But in the 2006, the default (fail-safe) condition for the 4-speed automatic transmission transfer clutch is "disengaged" (this is opposite to that for earlier 4EATs), which makes a causal relationship between the binding problem and the incorrect axles more difficult. And if there are no warning lights lit in the instrument cluster (e.g. the AT Oil Temp or Sport" light) when they should not be, it's not likely a sensor issue. (This could be confirmed if the Subaru dealer connects up the special Subaru Monitor and observes the AWD control signals.) If there's no signal anomalies, it's mechanical.

Which brings me, for one, back to those front axles and asking: exactly what was wrong with the first set? ETC provided some excellent explanations of what might happen if the axle is too long, or too short. While I can't see being too long affecting the transfer clutch, being too short could.

If an axle is too short, it's stub shaft (the part that goes into the front differential) could be pulled out from the differential enough that it's splines disengage from the mating splines on the inside of the related differential side gear. (This is especially the case if the axle shaft wasn't pushed in far enough into the side gear to fully engage the "circlip" in the side gear. The circlip locks the shaft to the side gear. This could happen even if the axle is the correct length but just not pushed in far, and hard enough to get the circlip to engage.) When this happens, even though the wheel won't turn, the differential will spin that side gear. (This would also lead to quite some noise as the ends of the splines near on the axle and those on the inside of the side gear grind against each other, and loss of fluid out the side of the differential, especially if the stub shaft is far enough out to expose the splines.)

The AWD control system would interpret the spinning side gear as a front wheel spinning (even though the wheel isn't properly connected to the differential), and it will engage the transfer clutch more fully. The car can actually be driven this way (noise and all) as the rear wheels will be powered through the clutch, although the ability to accelerate, especially from a stop would likely be affected. The transfer clutch isn't designed for this type of continuous load, and the stresses can cause grooves the clutch hubs, leading to the plates remaining engaged when they should be backed off.

If the problem is mechanical binding of the AWD clutch, it does not require replacement of the transmission. The clutch and related parts can be replaced fairly easily, even with the transmission on the car.

It's all a somewhat unlikely scenario, but possible.

I wonder if they still have that first set of axles. An examination of the end of the stub shaft might be revealing.

 

the part number of the first set installed was...
K4000-302063-FEQ CV SHAFT
The only thing wrong at the beginning was torn boots.
You guys are awesome! Thank you.
Last time I drove it, it was with the old axles and binding was still a problem when turning enough to pull into a parking space.

 

Keep in mind that if the boots were torn the binding or clicking when you turn would be from dry CV joints being noisy - this would not be a transmission issue.

 

If it was binding before you took it in, that changes things somewhat as there may have already been some internal damage to the Trans/diff/clutch assembly before you took it in.

We are concentrating on the axles themselves possibly being the issue. Aside from possible issues before it was taken in, we have to consider the competence of the mechanics during the repair. If the trans was indeed damaged before coming in, a competent mechanic would have noted this before starting any work. There is the possibility that they just didn't know what they were doing and made the situation worse. Most of us are familiar with the relatively simple job of replacing an axle on these cars so, we might think "How could they screw that up" ?.

Well, they put the wrong axles on and didn't know/couldn't tell. They either destroyed the steering knuckle/hub assembly with the wrong parts [forcing them to fit] or just sheer incompetence. They allowed a vehicle of questionable safety to leave their shop and be driven [if in doubt, they should have had it towed to someone who knew what they were doing].

We can only guess what transpired during this ordeal ... we can be relatively certain that these guys should not have been working on this car.

I didn't see much info on a search for that part number. One site referenced it as a Outback axle but, couldn't figure out what year it was for.

Ok, everyone take a guess as to how this was screwed up:

Mine- They didn't pull the roll pins out, pried the axle housing and pulled the stub axle out and didn't know how to put it back together [I was putting on my stupid hat and trying to think of something :]

 

If it was binding before you took it in, that changes things somewhat as there may have already been some internal damage to the Trans/diff/clutch assembly before you took it in.


g :]

Let me say this again. There was absolutely no problem before the "repair."
No clicking
No binding
No grinding
No vibrating

They noticed torn CV Boots when doing an oil change. We were about to embark on a 3-4000 mile road trip. We said "OK, replace them. Better safe than sorry," because we always maintain this vehicle as best we can.
NOW it's really broke.
We were supposed to leave last Sunday and I am missing a work trip with specific, dated, appointments and milestones that need to be met. They have had it since last Tuesday. This is Thursday. 10 Days and counting. 5 days behind on trip and counting.:28:

 

That part number shows up on one website as the one for the 06 2.5.

Axle Assembly

Being aftermarket, it still doesn't mean it fits properly, but the odds are that it would fit reasonably well. That suggests the work that was done the first time was the problem and not the part.

In this regard, the 06 axle doesn't use a roll pin arrangement. On the 06+ the inner joint has a shaft permanently attached to it. The shaft goes into the side of the differential and is held in by an expanding circlip. If the shaft isn't pushed in enough to allow the clip to engage, the splines could disengage and grind against each other. At the same time, because the shaft has moved out of the differential somewhat, instead of a smooth part being against the oil seal, the splines are there, offering no resistance to gear oil coming out, as was the case.

As noted, if the torque bind was there before the car went in for the axles the first time, then that and the axle install issue are probably not related. Perhaps it's just that the binding is noticed more now because the axles are working properly.

 

That's how I read that sentence as well.

Do yourself a favor and write all this down in a planner. Include dates, times, places, conversations, people, recommendations, observations [can ran fine on __/__ at ___AM and did X on ___/___ at __PM]. Dates tend to get jumbled especially with stress and anger and a less cohesive argument is less convincing. Save any documentation and write down anything relevant that may be said in these posts. Don't try to threaten or intimidate anyone [let a Lawyer do that with a letter]. I know you want to take it out on somebody but, trust me, it's counter productive and can easily turn a victim into a "bad guy".

It's starting to sound like they messed something up initially in the work and couldn't get the proper part to fix it by the time you came to pick it up.

Do you know the part number for the "correct" Axles they supposedly installed the second time around ? I'm curios if they just blamed shoddy work on the part and attempted to fix the problem the second time around and used the same axles.


Hopefully this already annoying issue can be resolved without litigation but, might want to start asking/ looking around for a Lawyer just in case

 

We have been keeping keeping a detailed journal. Thanks for the suggestion

 

I had thought that was the case when I posted comments earlier, but was thrown off by

Quote:
Last time I drove it, it was with the old axles and binding was still a problem when turning enough to pull into a parking space.
From this I understood "old axles" to refer to the original ones with the torn boots, meaning that the car had binding symptoms on turns before the axles were replaced the first time.

Thank you
The statement above referencing the old axles was at the repair phase when they put the original (old) axles back on and asked me, "try it now."

 

Some of this has already been covered, but what most likely happened is the mechanic did not push one or both of the cv axles all the way into the transfer case. The spline that goes into the transfer case on an '06 model has a clip on the end and it has to click in. That part of the shaft also has two sensor areas on the shaft next to the spline. If you drove it home 11 miles, there was some damage done... the end of the spline on the axle will get eaten away by the spline in the transfer case. If the spline gets eaten away too much (which it sounds like it did since they had to order new ones) the clip is 1/4" from the end, and could drop in the transfer case (possibly) and do some major damage. Since the shaft is not all the way in the xfer case, the sensors aren't lined up and performing like they should and you'll feel the car intermittently slipping and doing weird stuff, sensors will eventually turn the transmission off entirely. Subaru's disengage transmission to protect it. So you have to pull the cv axle, look at the spline damage, see if the clip is still there, hope that the internal xfer case spline is not damaged so you can slide in a new axle, and hope that all the metal spline grindings made it to the bottom of the xfer case and hope there is a magnet on the drain plug. So that's what happened. They didn't install the axles correctly the first time, said it was the wrong part, but they just didnt put them in right and they were probably damaged enough where they had to get new ones. Transmission issues WHILE the cv axles were installed improperly are due to the sensors not lining up on the axle. any major noises that still exist after it's all fixed should be transfer case related. The only evidence you might have (for legal purposes) is if you drain the front xfer case. There should be some metal shavings in there. New transmission? I don't think so. I would find that hard to believe.

 

Hey guys,
Quick question
I think a similar thing thing has just happened to me.
We needed to replace the LHF cv boot of our 06 H6,(split with oil leaking)
This was done and everything was fine, about 7-10 days later, travelling to the airport and the speed picking up to 80km, there was an almighty bang, and the vehicle lost momentum.
Vehicle was returned to the same guys that replaced the boot, a quick discussion with them suggests that the transmission has gone.
Based on the previous discussion, if in fitting the CV boot the CV axel wasn't fitted correct could this damage the transmission??