Has anyone done it?

 

Ordered my Amsoil for it today, will do it Saturday.

 

What fluid is recommended for it?

 

Atf+4 i believe

 

I changed out the transfer case and both diff's. Very easy. It takes just a 8mm allen wrench on all three units to both take off the fill plug and drain plug. All are easy to get to. I used Amsoil severe gear oil in the diffs and their ATF signature series in the transfer case. Amsoil says no friction modifier is required so I did not use any, in fact have never in any of my vehicles when using Amsoil and never had an issue. Just thought I would mention it.

All get filled to the fill plug level so what I did is jack up the right side of the vehicle, took out all three fill plugs first then one by one, drained out all three units. I lowered the vehicle back down to level it out and get the last bit of old oil out and then jacked it back up again.

I then put all three drain plugs back in and filled up the two diffs first (I just use a hand pump w/ a hose that sits in the oil bottle) until oil began to drip out of the fill hole, then filled the transfer case until it was full, crawled back out and lowered the vehicle so any excess oil drained out of the fill holes (since the vehicle was jacked up at an angle and the diff was not level), then jacked it back up and put all the fill plugs back in. Total time was about 30 minutes.

I have always been a fanatic about spraying silicone on ANY piece of rubber under a vehicle at oil change time so I also did that, all mounts, CV boots, exhaust hangers, suspension components etc. I have never in 20 yrs had a mount or anything rubber fail me, I look at it like we spend time putting protectant on the visable places like dashes and interior but the rubber components under the car never get any love till its too late. A can of silicone at every oil change has worked for me over the years so I got a lot done in a half hour. Hope this helps for anyone considering doing it. Super easy to get to it all.

 

How much fluid is needed to do this? and how much does the fluids cost, estimated? Thanks for the great write up!

 

The transfer case took exactly 2 quarts of ATF. Between the front and rear diffs, I bought 3 quarts and used just over 2. Could I have gotten away w/ 2 if I had not let some leak out as I filled, yeah. My Vette takes the same weight in its diff (75w90) so I dont mind having some sitting around. On the Amsoil site they tell you how much your vehicle needs in pints so you have to convert that to quarts (2 pints = 1 qt) so its not an even number so you will always end up with some extra.

I always use Amsoil as I tow w/ the Durango and I race my Vette so I consider what I do 'severe duty' and Amsoil has always ranked as one of the top oils if not the top oil in tests. I have sent in oil samples over the years to Blackstone and have had better results and less wear running the Amsoil so I stay with it. All of this justifies the little bit more in cost. The Signature Series ATF is $11.50/qt and the gear lube is $14.90/qt. So figure $80. total shipped and with tax (maybe could have saved $14. on that extra qt). I will have to look at the maintenence schedule for these units but its not like you are going to do this again for quite some time so imo its well worth the cost. The fluid I drained out of the rear diff was like black water. I have 2200 miles on the Durango and have towed three times on camping trips and was shocked at how black and thin the oil seemed out of the rear dif. The front was clear, so the fact its supposed to be full time awd tells me the rear really gets the majority of the wear, so glad I did this! BTW, there are a lot of great oils out there, by no means is this an Amsoil rant, just what I prefer to use.

 

At the risk of reviving an old thread....I have a 2011 Citadel with 55k and am planning to inspect my transfer and rear-diff fluid (dealer wants a small fortune to do this), however, it appears that my vehicle has a completely different setup than the OP. Looking at the the diff, it appears that the fill/drain are on opposite sides and require a 14mm (or larger) allen.

Here's what I believe to be the drain-hole (bottom):


On the opposite,here's what I believe to be the fill-hole (top-left):



Question: anyone with a 2011 with similar setup performed this service, and how does it vary (if at all) from the OP's experience?

Thanks in advance.

Edit: correction to state that it was mikeinaz's experience, not the OP.

 

I haven't been under my Durango yet, but plan to be soon as camping season is just around the corner here and this is my new tow rig.

While I cannot confirm the size of the fill and drain plugs, a useful piece of advice that was shared with me several years ago - Make sure you can get the fill plug loose BEFORE you remove the drain plug.

-Rod

 

Those are the correct holes, they may differ from my size but its all the same way of doing it. Rod has great advice, take off the fill plug first as you don't want to drain the unit and be left empty, only to find you cant get the fill plug off. Should be a snap looking at those pics although as you mentioned, it may be a different setup than I have. If you have a fluid pump, it makes it even easier. You can pick one up at any auto parts store, even WalMart has them for a few bucks. You can leave your bottle on the ground and just pump the fluid through a hose into the fill hole. Go put some clean oil in your ride!