IWE not disengaging
#1
IWE not disengaging
2010 F150 XLT 5.4. I have spent a considerable amount of time dealing with this 4x4 system on my truck. I have 2” front spacers with a 1” rear spacer. While installing the fronts I ended up tearing a small hole in my CV boot. I decided to replace both front CV axles since I have 155,000 miles on my truck. I installed both CV axles and seals. Afterwards everything seemed to be working fine until I started to smell burning grease about 500 miles later. Come to find that the boot on the front drive shaft where it meets the front differential has blown out spitting grease all over the exhaust and oil pan causing the smell. I did some investigation and found that my IWEs are not disengaging. They are locked to the cv half axles all the time. I have vacuum going to both IWEs. I bypassed the IWE solenoid and connected the vacuum line that goes to the IWEs directly to the vacuum line coming from the engine and they still won’t disengage. I took the driver side cv axle back out and cleaned the IWE and reinstalled everything yet they still stay engaged all the time. One thing I did notice is that the new CV axle seems to stick out about an inch from where it meets the differential. I tried pulling on it but the C-clip seems to be seated so I’m not sure if it can go in any further. Prior to replacing the cv axles the IWEs were functional and would engage/disengage. Any ideas as to why they suddenly stopped working? I really don’t want to buy new IWEs if It’s not the problem.