Re-boot or replace?

[garrett.fell]

What's the conventional wisdom here? The boots on the CV's are known to split after some-time. Do you re-boot it or replace the whole assembly?

Here's why I ask. About 2 years ago or so - I noticed that the drivers outer CV boot was split and it had flung grease everywhere. At that time I decided to re-boot the CV and had picked up one from the stealership at around $50.

I read about the short-cut procedure to remove the axle from the CV - rather than disassemble the entire
mess, so i decided to try that. After much trouble I finally hit the magic-spot for the axle to pop out of the CV and I simply rebooted the axle and re-assembled.

Or did I?

I never could get the axle to seat back into the CV correctly - although it seemed okay on assembly. The first time I took it for a ride - I got to the end of my street and could hear the axle popping and grinding on stuff. I unsuccessfully tried to reinstall it a few times. I ended up taking it to a local Indy and he replaced the whole axle. I want to say the bill was about $500 with new transmission control software updates as well.

Anyway - so fat forward to today. The passengers side CV is torn and I need to do something about it.

Do I re-try the quick and easy procedure or go the entire disassembly route? (which looks like a giant pain in the ass from what I recall - and requires special tools?)

What have you done?


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