Filling rear axle

[M_Temple]

New boy here - renovating a 62 Trav that has been in a barn for 25 yrs. All pretty original and in reasonable nick. Full strip down, rewood, respray and rebuild. Anyway ..... the rear axle has a drain plug in the base, and a breather tube on one side axle, but no filler plug on the rear of the diff part way up as shown in the Workshop manual, nor any plug on the front as I think was the case in the very early diffs. Any ideas anyone? What am I missing? No evidence of any 'bodging' (or is it 'bodgeing'?), or mods - and there is a MOWOG stamp on the back plate.

As the axle is off the car I could just fill with the requisite 1.5pts of HYPOY 90 with the axle upside down, but that means no 'top-up' at servicing w/o removing the axle! I must be missing something obvious ....

Awaiting the response showing how big a plonker I am...

[Willie]

I am afraid it is possible that you have no means of filling the diff as a
late type diff carrier unit has no filler on it but the axle casing has. So, if
a later diff unit has been fitted to an earlier axle you end up with no filler!
the easiest way would be to drain it, then remove the plastic breather pipe from the axle casing (the top part snaps off and the tube part unscrews )and pump in the carefully measured correct amount of EP oil.
Since you have the axle off the car then your own suggestion is probably the best. The other method is to jack up one side of the axle,
remove the half shaft, and pour the requisite amount in that way

[Jefftav]

I had the same problem and the way around it was to cut the filler plug leaving about an inch of metal around it from a scrap casing and then cut a similar size hole in my good axle casing and weld the plug into the hole then you have a filler plug for regular checks/top ups.

I have had this for 2 yrs now with no problems.

Jeff

[M_Temple]

Thanks to you both - at least I'm reassured I've not missed something obvious. I think I'll just pour in the requisite amount of oil through the filler plug with the axle inverted, and every 20k mls or so, drain the lot and refill a measured amount via the breather tube, or the half-shaft method.

I am reassured that even after 25 years when I drained the axle I got just under 1.5pts out!

[bmcecosse]

Just fill it via the breather hole. It's not a level guide of course - so you must drain it completely and then measure in the correct amount. Don't overfill - it will flood the brakes - and make sure the breather can still breathe !