2002 Sierra Denali AWD.

One of my stub axles for the front differential has excessive play radially. It wobbles in the side of the differential by hand about .150". The other side has only about .010" play. There is no real rotational slop nor any noise when cruising or under light acceleration but there is a grinding sound when accelerating hard.

How hard is this to fix? What special tools would I need for this? Is there any good place that sells them rebuilt/exchange if this is my best bet?
Thanks,
Scott

 

If your axle bearings are gone, chances are the carrier bearings are too. That doesn't necessarily make it so, but usually the carrier bearings are the 1st to go in these things. Jasper is the only company that I can think of that advertises rebuilding the AWD front differentials, but in reality the regular 4WD front diff's are the same as the AWD units anyway. The only difference is the passenger side axle and axle tube. The axle is a one piece part in the AWD unit and there is no engagement fork and actuator. From what I've seen the Jasper unit does not come with the axles or passenger side axle tube anyways, so you might as well just pick up a 4WD unit and swap your parts onto it.

 

from what i gathered so far, the front axle bearings are probably my only issue as of now.