MTFCA Forum

Hi all,

I wonder if you can give me some advice for the repair of the oil leak on this 1912 rear axle?
Is there an easy way to do this or need the rear axle been taken apart?
What is the best way to do it?

Thanks
Andre
Belgium

Is it coming from the differential housing? My car seems to have developed a slow leak from this area as well.

Fixing that leak has been a problem forever. The design was changed with the introduction of the straight axle tubes in 1915 to overcome inherent problems.
I believe it cannot be fixed without stripping the rear axle assembly. A very poor choice of repair is to bronze all the rivets and the circle around the tapered tube. It works, but many a good axle housing has been ruined in doing so, making it very difficult for a correct restoration later on. It is far better to drill out the rivets and remove the centre castings from the tubes. Then the tubes and castings should be hot tanked to remove all traces of grease and crud, so you have absolutely clean components with which to work.
On my 1912 van the castings had weld repairs done first, which warped them, so they needed re-machining to true them. I used 1/4" grade 3 nuts and bolts to hold the pieces together, rather than riveting them. There are two areas on the casting to be sealed against the axle tube, a smaller outer land seats inside the taper in the axle housing and the machined circle which takes the rivets.On these I use another Loctite product, a red flange sealant which does not set hard. The hex head bolts were reshaped to appear as rivets. To hold them while the nuts were tensioned, the inner threaded end was slotted to allow a screwdriver to hold them. Loctite threadlock was used to hold them, and the slit in the bolt gently spread to act as an extra lock.

The van has been on the road now for 25 years and has done heaps of city driving on promotional work. There is still no sign of any leakage, so I consider it fixed.

Hope this helps.
Allan from down under.

Allan,
Do you have photos of this repair?

Thanks
Andre
Belgium

I won't labor this point but I have said in numerous posts that T differential housings were never designed for oil, just grease.

Andre, I can photograph some 1913 housings I have done, but I cannot post them on the forum. I need an email address to send them to you.

Allan from down under.

will send you a PM.

Thanks
Andre
Belgium

André, I have the same issue than you and I repaired it with this without removing the oil in the rear axle.

I started with this
After a week still have a very little leak so I used on top the Permatex 2-Form A Gasket Sealant is for dressing/sealing cut gaskets on rigid flanges. Usualy I used with my engine Pan and transmission but work really nicely too with my rear axle. Now I drive the car for 6 mounths without any leaks from the axle. Hope that help before removing the rear axle and replace the gasket.

You might try cleaning up the area well, If you can, drain the oil from the axle. Wipe it down with naptha or lacquer thinner and quickly smear the area with black ultra sealer. try to work the sealer into the joint. This sealer is flexible and will help. If that doesn't work, park with a pan underneath and wipe the area before you show the car.
Norm

On my '14's rear axle, I soaked the housings for several days in mineral spirits. To do it, I made a temporary tank by nailing four 2 x 12s together and lining the resulting rim with a sheet of 6 mil plastic. I put a piece of scrap OSB in the bottom so that any sharp edges on the housings wouldn't cause a leak. After removing the housings and letting the drain for a few days I blew them out good with compressed air and let them air dry several more days in the hot summer sun. Then I disassembled the "tank" (nothing to store!) and set the wood and plastic aside for another use.

Once I was satisfied that the housings were hospital clean and dry, I mig'd over the heads of the rivets on the inside to strengthen and seal them. Then I ran some Permatex around the inside of the seam where the tubes joined the halves of the punkins. Finally, making an applicator from a 14" long piece of strap steel with the last inch of one end bent at a 90 degree angle, I reached into and sealed the tube/bearing housing joints with fresh JB Weld. Upon final assembly I installed two paper housing gaskets with more Permatex. No leaks, not a speck, for almost 20 years.

Now I'm getting a few drops from the housing center joint but I think that's caused by the lower housing bolts' stretching. I'm going to replace the LH axle this winter because it's gotten bent out at the end from driving the car on the lunar landscapes that NY calls roads, so when I do I'm going to make a new set of bolts and nuts from Grade 8 steel to help with the stretching issue, along with the added truss rod that I installed last summer.

I had a hogs head on my 19 that leaked from a crack at the right front.
I cleaned the area with carburetor cleaner and used black hight temp RTV.
That leak stopped and it was hard to see the repair.

I posted my disassembly and sealing on my '14 a while back. Can't find it now but taking it apart cured mine.

In addition to all the excellent sealing advice, if you follow R.V. Anderson's method, you may also want to paint the area of the joint with GLPT resin, which is used as an insulator and sealer in electric motors. It was also used quite commonly as an internal sealing layer on the engines and transmissions of such car makes as Franklin. Both my Franklin engine and transmission cases, which were cast of aluminum, were coated with Glyptal resin to seal voids and pinholes, which are fairly common in aluminum castings. I understand that Packard also sprayed the aluminum cylinder blocks and transmission cases internally with glyptal as well. You can buy it at any large electrical store, and it comes in small bottles, so it isn't that expensive. Thin it with MEK, and apply it and let it dry. If it has been thinned with MEK, it will soak and penetrate any tiny passages, and plug them completely. The only thing is the area you apply it to, must be ABSOLUTELY clean. R.V's procedure would work very well for a glyptal application.