Hey guys,

I'm about to buy a differential remotely (shipped from 600 miles away).

The seller is telling me that the donor car only has 25 000 miles.

The pictures are telling me otherwise. There is some kind of pitting, or darker area, in the center of the drive side gears.

Should I be concerned and investigate further before spending hundreds of dollars? Or if this is about right and it will drive just fine for many years to come?

Thanks for your precious input.

 

It difficult, for me, to tell from your pic. I guess my concern would be what the sellers location is. Is he near saltwater? Did it come from a flood car? Normally, C5 diff gears are pretty tough. Sorry I can't tell you more than this from the pic. Allow me to say this: Trust your gut feelings/first impressions. If you aren't getting a nice warm feeling from the seller, and you suspect previous damage of any kind, I'd pass on it. There are literally a hundred different rear diffs out there for sale. Don't let price be your only purchasing factor. In my opinion, seller has one big strike against him if you are saying you see the quality of the diff as being different than you're being led to believe. I'm not saying don't buy it. I AM saying be careful, because this is a fairly labor intensive swap. If you save a couple hundred dollars because it's not too far away an saves on shipping costs, and also the price, it could come back and really bite you. It may have around 25,000 miles on it. But what kind of miles? A lot of track duty versus highway miles? 25,000 miles, but been sitting in a high humidity garage for the last 3 years with no diff oil? Only you can answer these questions. You can't ask the seller too many questions. Hope this helps you somewhat.

 

That looks fine me. Mine was worse than yours. I'll try to find my pictures.