1993 Volvo 850 Axle Assembly Replacement.

Mace · Post by **Mace** » 30 Aug 2007, 14:03

I know for sure that upon my last maintence check, my CV boots were both ripped, meaning by now, the joints are destroyed more or less. Since it would be probably the smartest thing to just replace the entire front drive axle assembly (bear with me, I know practically nothing about car parts/terms), does anyone have any experience with replacing it yourself? Can it be done, or is this more of a procedure that's best left to professionals? I do have friends at my disposal who work on cars all the time so I'm sure if it is possible, they can help me. I just don't have the money to shell out going to a dealer or other mechanic for this, but I also know I'm going to doom my car if I don't deal with it soon. I've put this off for WAY too long and I know it's just a matter of time before I break down on the highway or something because of it.

Post by **Ozark Lee** » 30 Aug 2007, 16:04

It is not that bad of a job. First you need axles - here is a good source:

http://www.raxles.com/

By far the hardest part is getting the nut off of the hub. A lot of PB Blaster the night before helps as does air tools. If you don't have air tools get a cheap set of 3/4" drive metric sockets at Harbor Freight and a 4 foot piece of pipe that will fit the breakover bar. The only other trick is to pop the transmission end out of the transaxle, large screwdrivers work well. They will fight with you right up to the point where they just pop out.

...Lee

chuckcintron · Post by **chuckcintron** » 30 Aug 2007, 16:10

I just put both left and right FEQ axles on, purchased from FCP Groton. I think they are around $75 each. Been on the car for about 500 miles now...way to early to tell but no complaints so far.

Mine is a 1997 850GLT wagon.

It wasn't too hard -- but probably a bit easier for me since I was replacing the struts and control arms at the same time. Pulling out the old axles and putting the new ones in was much easier without that other stuff in the way (in my opinion).

Here's a writeup of someone else who recently did this job. I didn't have any of the difficulties or issues that were noted in this other thread:

https://www.matthewsvolvosite.com/chat/p ... hp?t=11078

Without the struts in the way, it was easy to "wiggle" the old axles out, and to also "wiggle" the new driver's side axle in (and get the circlip to seat correctly). Also, I didn't use a hub puller; just backing off the axle nuts and then pounding them silly with my 5lb hand sledge did the trick to get the axles out of the hubs. Since the old axles were going to the scrapyard, I didn't care if I ruined them.

Also, I have a set of 20mm drive sockets and a very large one 20mm driver. I call it "Goliath". This made getting those axle nuts off a piece of cake. I would not want to attempt this with either 3/8" or 1/2" drives.

Mace · Post by **Mace** » 30 Aug 2007, 19:26

Cool, thanks for the feedback. If I can get my friends to do this for me, that's going to be so helpful.

So since you lot here seem to have a much better clue then I do, if I was to take this into a mechanic or

god forbid a dealer, any ballpark estimates on what it would cost me? This is of course figuring that yet another problem won't become apparent at the same time.....

chuckcintron · Post by **chuckcintron** » 31 Aug 2007, 07:27

Just a wild guess...could be off by 2x...but I'd guess that the axles from the dealer would be $300 each, and they'd book three hours of labor at another $300...so my guess would be around $900 to do both sides.

A quick phone call to the dealer would verify; there's very little guesswork when they do their estimating.

-Chuck