Hello,
this is my first post and I'm hoping to find some help. Bought a 2004 Escape 4x4 for my son for his first car. Doing some repairs on it and one of them was replacing the rear differential seals for the CV axles. I was able to do the drivers side one with moderate headaches but it turned out ok. The passenger side one is another story. Got the axle out and replaced the seal but when it comes to reinstalling the axle,I cannot for the life of me get the splined shaft back through the outer hub no matter which angle I try. It took some effort to get it removed from the hub but it did come out. I've been working on my own vehicles for 20 years so I'm not a greenhorn as far as fixing cars but this has me stumped. Am I missing something as far as the reinstall process? Any tricks that you guys may have co.e up with along the way? Any help would be appreciated. The Haynes manual doesn't help right now at all. Thanks in advance.

 

You will need to get in close to see how the side gear in the differential is situated. In the process of installing the driver's side you most likely rotated the differential and the side gear may have dropped and lost it's position. If this is the case ,you will need to remove the differential cover and realign the side gear( the gear the splined end of the cv shaft slides into) once this is corrected you should be able to insert the end of the cv shaft. I would not recommend that you reinstall the differential cover until the other parts are assembled.
You will need some black RTV and some new 75W140 synthetic gear lube to finish just that part. Pretty sure they used synthetic gear lube in there, you might verify that with the specification section in your owner's manual.

 

I finally ended up getting it back into place. A friend came over and helped pry the arm back out of the way. Just needed an extra set of hands. Thanks for the suggestions hanky. Appreciate it.