Hi all
First post here so a quick intro: I was the lucky recipient of a Defender 110 in 2016 through the Land Rover Bursary grant programme via the Royal Geographical Society. The lovely vehicle in question is named Georgina, a 2016 reg Euro-spec (ie. left hand drive) Station Wagon and one of the last off the production line. She has been with me for just over two years, doing a few tens of thousands of km of seriously challenging off-roading and driving on very poor roads in Armenia and Georgia (video)... and naturally she's starting to exhibit some wear and tear.
After a recent long roadtrip I spotted a bunch of brown stuff being emitted from the right hand rear hub – see pics at the link below. I thought it was just rust on the wheel bolts or studs as she'd been standing for a few months, combined with water from a car wash, but that wasn't it. I jacked up the wheel and found that while there's no play in the bearings, there was a bit of rotational play around the axle between the driving member (which on this specimen is a fixed part of the half shaft) and the hub itself. It's noticeable only when you rotate the wheel, perhaps 1mm movement between the bolt heads and the surface beneath, which seemed to have been enough to wear away the gasket, and probably helped explain the minor clunk when taking up drive that I'd been noticing for a few months. Anyway I unbolted it with the steel wheel still attached (shearing one (rusted?) bolt in the process) and had a look inside – sure enough, corrosion, moisture, rust-coloured greasy muck, and the scant remains of the gasket. I slid the whole half shaft out of the diff – a couple more rust spots and water – but couldn't find any significant sign of wear to the splines at the diff end. Put it all back together. Still the same movement.
Here's a couple of pics and a makeshift video: https://photos.app.goo.gl/CKiYucqUFQ2UQ1RdA
What I'm hoping you clever folk can help with is determining possible causes. I don't really understand why there should be any movement at all if the member / half shaft is bolted directly onto the hub – unless the bolt holes have become worn over time, but I couldn't see any evidence of that. I'm hoping the bearings are still serviceable if I clean up the hub's internals and repack it all with fresh grease, but if there's no outer seal because of the rotational play, the gasket will be useless and problem will recur (especially if I'm doing a lot of driving in rain or on muddy tracks), eventually knackering the whole hub.
Your experienced advice for this total noob would be very much welcomed. I'm a handy enough mechanic when it comes to bicycles and DIY, but only just getting started on cars since I became Georgina's steward. I have all the usual basic tools and workshop kit, so would prefer to diagnose this and do the fix myself if possible before taking her to the dealership and paying through the nose!
Cheers,
Tom
