Had an issue with vibration at speed, and a loud squeak when in gear (would coast nice and quiet in Neutral) Decided to service the drivetrain. Drained and filled differentials, drained, filled and changed the filter in the transmission.. Ordered the parts to rebuild the front drive shaft (not done yet) Got to the Transfer Case and attached is what I found while looking for the fill plug. Seems I have a gaping hole.. and my even bigger concern is there are no threads that I can tell.. just a nice, big smooth hole.

Advice? Suggestions?

 

The drain plug is in the large plate underneath at an angle and the filler/level plug is at the rear of the t case on the vertical face. I don't know where that hole could be on the t case.

 

This is on the vertical face, right behind what i assume are brake lines..

 

Looks like the inspection hole for the fly wheel and those are the transmission cooler lines. Should be a rubber plug in there.

 

Makes more sense.. rubber would be 15 years old.

I would guess without the rubber "stopper" oil would be flung out of there and thrown everywhere?

 

Looks like your oil pan rather than your t-case, and that is an access hole as mentioned above. The missing rubber plug is to keep dirt and debris out rather than to keep oil in. So you have some oil leaks to investigate from the looks of it. Oil contamination is usually what causes the plug to swell up and come out, or someone neglected to reinstall it during a repair sometime in the past.

 

all the oil is probably from the valve covers leaking.

 

Never would have believed it but following the forums and doing what was suggested I dropped the front drive shaft, locked the CDL (THAT was a pain to figure out) and no more vibration.. what's amazing is this truck ALWAYS vibrated a little at high speed (>70 MPH) but lately but got REAL bad. Visual and physical inspection didn't point to the driveshaft at all, no play, no movement, no clunking.. but damn if I didn't drive without it and my Rover drives like new..

 

So to everyone in this thread and others I used as resources THANK YOU...

Now I can't get the caps off of the U Joints.. tried one tonight it's coming out about a 1/16th of an inch beyond the yoke and not budging any further.

 

They can be a pain to get out but it can be done. I'm hoping you also got the center ball kit to rebuild that portion as well. Since that is generally what fails and wipes out your tranny.