Traction-Lok Differential Rebuild - Carbon Plating

With a drain pan in place, it's safe to remove the differential cover. Be careful-the draining fluids can be messy and the smell is nearly impossible to get off your hands and clothes.

The fluid had probably been in this differential for 10 years and 110,000 miles. Dan cleaned it and kept it off himself by repeatedly spraying it with brake cleaner and scraping runny mixture into the drain pan.

Remove the center-pin lock bolt. Put a wrench on one of the bolts holding the ring gear to the differential to keep it from moving. Now you can remove the center pin and axle C-clips.

Remember to remove the plastic ABS sensors before you pull the axles. Be careful, as they are known to break. Dan usually spends half an hour trying to get them out, then he breaks them and moves on. Luckily, these came right out.

The axles should slide out easily. This would be a great opportunity to replace the bearings and seals, as you don't want to take apart the rearend again.

Remove the end caps holding the differential in place. Mark the caps and bolts so you can put them back the same way they came out.

Now the differential should be ready to come out. It isn't light, so you may have to pry it out, as shown. Watch out for additional fluid left in, on, and around the differential. Clean the empty axle housing with more brake cleaner.

With the differential on a clean workbench, hit the ring-gear bolts with an air ratchet. If the differential moves around too much, you can put it in a vise. Remove the ring gear and inspect it for damage if you're reusing it.

With the S-spring out, you should be able to remove the spider gears one at a time. They should spin right out.

Finally, remove the side gears from each side. The friction plates, steel reaction plates, and shims-an assembly called the clutch pack-should come out with them. This is a filthy and smelly job, so Dan recommends rubber gloves.

During the disassembly, Dan noted that there was quite a bit of play in the spider and end gears. It turned out that so much material had worn off the friction plates (left) and steel reactor plates (right) that the assembly was no longer held together tightly. Note the total lack of friction material and the grooves worn into both plates-this Traction-Lok was not functioning properly.

This is the order that Ford recommends you stack the friction and steel plates. For reference, starting from right to left, it goes steel, friction, steel, steel, friction, steel, friction, and shim. Some enthusiasts use different orders and even extra friction plates for a tighter differential, but we haven't tested these methods with the new carbon-fiber friction plates.