I snapped one at 223,000 miles finally on my SR

It's been making some noise for about a year or more, no tears in the boots, no holes or signs of lacking grease, was offroading a few weeks back and climbed a steep hill under a fair amount of throttle, loaded down and had 4 people in it, made it up the hill but over the top it started getting crunchy and once i shifted back to AWD it was obvious that the front end was having a problem.


I pulled busted driver side axle today, the boots were perfect and full of grease still, i cut the outer boot knowing that's where the break occurred to separate, clean and inspect it, the bearing cage exploded, pictured is all but one piece of the cage, if i had manual locking hubs i could just unlock the hub and keep driving but this caused constant grinding noise and i feared it would eventually start to bind, i didnt want to risk that so I parked it until the new axle came in.

for anyone wanting to change your CV's, it's not bad, have to remove the outer tie rod end, both ball joints from the steering knuckle, remove the outer axle clip, you dont have to remove the outer splined hub but it does make it easier and remove the brake caliper. then take the steering knuckle completely off, dont forget the ABS sensor if equipped.

then the old one pops out and the new one goes right back in, reverse the steps.