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Norskeman's avatar
Norskeman
Explorer
Oct 28, 2013

Transfer case maint.

Changed the fluid in the transfer case in our 2011 Chevy Silverado today - level was low - none coming out the fill plug. Got a little over a quart of fluid out. Just a little over 31,000 miles on the truck. Refilled with Castrol TranSynd - same that I put in the transmission. I think TranSynd will better than Dex VI that the manual calls for. I'll be checking the level in the transfer case a little more often now.

Didn't think of taking pictures of the drain plug but I found some on the internet that looked the same as mine. the nut is rusted more on mine though.

Drain pug looked like this:


After cleaning:


Used one of these to get the fluid in the transfer case:
Custom Accessories 36670 Pennzoil Fluid Transfer Pump

  • That sure seems like a lot of metal on the first plug pic. Isn't the capacity of that transfer case almost 2 Quarts? If you only got out one qt, you might have been significantly low. Any sign of a leak?
  • The plug on my xfer case looked the same.... scared the poop out of me until I did some research and learned it was common. There's a lot of metal in a xfer case and that's really not that much metal. It's just the magnet doing its job.
  • TucsonJim wrote:
    That sure seems like a lot of metal on the first plug pic. Isn't the capacity of that transfer case almost 2 Quarts? If you only got out one qt, you might have been significantly low. Any sign of a leak?


    No signs of any leakage. I have read that the over time the fluid seems to lower - does not make sense to me. I'll just check it more often - this was the first time I checked it because I had no signs of leakage.

    I did expect some stuff on the magnet - as noted above allot of metal in the transfer case and I would expect wear products to be present on the first drain - guess I should have done it sooner. May do another drain and fill in the spring after using 4X4 during the winter.