Thought the group may like to see the catastrophic failure in the front axle differential that just occurred on my L245DT causing the 4WD to stop working. I was able to remove the left axle tube assembly without removing the whole front axle assembly from the tractor. I was shocked to see the ring gear come out without the carrier and other gears. All six bolts had sheared off and were ground up and shredded along with shredding the large ball bearing retainer. I am attempting to recover now. I was able to remove all six sheared of bolts out of the carrier. I have thread repair inserts on order for the wallowed out threads along with a new bearing, "O" ring seal and six new Kubota bolts. Still have to get the damaged bearing out.
I've owned the tractor since new. Has around 2500 hours on it. 4WD up to this point has always worked fine. Never heard any noises or crunching. Fortunately all of the debris was contained to the outside of the differential gear carrier, hence no damage to the gears. I suspect the bolts started working loose one by one until they just sheared off.
Haven't found the torque rating for the ring gear to carrier bolts and the torque rating for the bolts for the axle tube assembly to the differential. If anyone has those specs please let me know.
![20220310_142926[1].jpg](https://orangetractortalks.com/forums/attachments/20220310_142926-1-jpg.76441/)
I've owned the tractor since new. Has around 2500 hours on it. 4WD up to this point has always worked fine. Never heard any noises or crunching. Fortunately all of the debris was contained to the outside of the differential gear carrier, hence no damage to the gears. I suspect the bolts started working loose one by one until they just sheared off.
Haven't found the torque rating for the ring gear to carrier bolts and the torque rating for the bolts for the axle tube assembly to the differential. If anyone has those specs please let me know.
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