How to Replace CV Axle Shaft 1995-2005 Pontiac Sunfire

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Hi. I'm Mike Green. I'm one of the owners of 1A Auto. I want to help you save time and money repairing and maintaining your vehicle. I'm going to use my 20 plus years experience restoring and repairing cars and trucks like this to show you the correct way to install parts from 1A Auto.com. The right parts installed correctly. That's going to save you time and money. Thank you and enjoy the video.

In this video we will be showing you how to replace the front axle on this 1997 Pontiac Sunfire. This car is a manual transmission vehicle, but the replacement is generally the same procedure just the axles are a little different. This is the same for any pretty much for 92 to 05 Sunfire, Cavalier and very similar for just about any front wheel drive vehicle. Tools you will need are some various millimeter sockets, large 30 mm socket for the hub nut, a hammer and a pry bar.

First step is to remove the wheel. You can see here I've raised it up on a lift and I have air tools. If you're working with hand tools you want to have the car down on the ground, loosen everything up, then raise it and secure it with a jack or jack stands. What you can do to get your half shaft out is you can remove your two strut bolts and this hub nut. Then pull the steering mechanism away and then you will be able to get your half shaft. Now on this hub nut if you don't have an impact wrench you are going to want to loosen it before you raise your car up. You want to have the wheel on and then you can use a hand wrench to loosen it up, but I have an impact wrench so I can do it up in the air like this.

You can just kind of tap it and watch the axle and make sure it moves out of the hub. As long as you're not beating it real hard. As soon as you get it moving then you can use your rubber hammer to get it going. Now you want to have your wheels turn opposite of where you are and pull this last bolt out. That will allow you to get your axle free here. You want to be careful not to stretch or stress your break line too much. You should be able to push your axle through. Push on it, bring it up and out like that. The axle is up right there up on top. It's out of the hub. Now I'm underneath. Here's where my axle goes into my transmission. This car is a standard transmission so automatic transmission is going to look a little different, but it will be the same idea. Also I have a catch pan underneath because when I take that axle out the fluid is going to come out. I'm going to use a bar here and I'm going to pry and put pressure up top on the transmission. I want to avoid bending and damaging this seal here. Then you can remove the axle from right here.

Again see the original axle and here's the replacement axle from 1AAuto. Some important things to note is the ends are the same and the replacement axle is the same and it has this compression ring just like the original. Then very important on this end, you can see it has the ABS sensor ring which is all the same. Then when we do the reinstallation we're going to install this old axle because there's actually nothing wrong with the CV joints in it.

Put the axle back in. Feed it through underneath and guide it into place. I've got into the transmission now. You are going to want to push it down where I need it to go. I've got it back in this position. I'm going to basically just push on the assembly and pull on the steering mechanism and everything here. Pull the axle down into place. I'm just going to be pushing and forcing to get the axle back into the hub.

The axle is all the way back into the transmission here. My steering is straightened back out. Get the bolts in here. Put the bolts right in using the hammer. Put my bolts back on. The axle is still not in the hub that well here so I'll shake it around a little bit. Then I will put the washer and hub nut back on. Now I've got my torque wrench set to 95 foot pounds.

I've got my car on the ground. I've got these two lug nuts on so I can get the wheel cover back on. They are tight. Now I've got my torque wrench set at 144 foot pounds. I'll put my wheel cover on. Put in the rest of my lug nuts. My lug nuts are on there and tightened up a little bit. Now I'm just tightening them to 75 foot pounds. I do the star pattern. I put the lug nut covers on and just use my socket and by hand just tighten them up.

Obviously that dip stick was made to get to from down underneath the car. Dealerships have a little machine that they have a look hook on so they can fill it nice and easy. I'm just going to show you have to fill it up from the top. You can reach that dip stick by reaching down in here and even me with my kind of larger arm I can get down in and reach the dip stick and pull it out. What you need is about a two foot piece of hose. Just put it down into that area. Now I'm going to reach back down in there and I'm going to find that hose and I'm going to stick it right down into the hole where I just pulled the dip stick from. The fluid you use is an 85-90 or 80-90 and you can see it just has a little tip which I'll cut off and that tip can go right down in to the hose. I poked a hole the bottom of this so some air can get in there and I'm just letting it drain. I'm not trying to squeeze it in there. I've filled it and I'm back in here with my dip stick. Put it in, pull it out and sure enough we are right between the add and the max there. So we will put the dip stick back in. Pull the filler hose out and we're all set.

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