B&M Differential Cover Black Cast Aluminum 9.75 F-150 2009-2017

Freddy: The factory differential cover on our 2016 F-150 is actually already leaking, so today we're going to fix it and give our truck a nice, custom look, and improve the longevity of our differential by installing this B&M differential cover. I have Jeremy from B&M. What can you tell me about this?

Jeremy: Thanks for having me, Freddy. Yeah, this is our new differential cover for the 9-3/4 Ford rear ends. It gives you a little bit of extra capacity for the fluid, helps keep the rear end. It has a fill plug and a drain plug to help service the rear end a lot easier. Comes with all the hardware. We've got also load support bolts here for the carrier. Bearings helps keep it a little more intact, keep from twisting, really strengthens the rear end, plus it makes it look good, especially on a lifted truck you're gonna see that. First thing you see is kind of the diamond on it.

Freddy: Nice. All right, let's get to the installation.

Tools you'll need for this installation: a lift or a jack and jack stands, 13 mm socket, 3/4" socket, an extension, 1/4" hex key, 3/8" hex key, a 5/16 by 18 tap or thread cleaner, 3/8" ratchet, a torque wrench, a rubber mallet, a gasket scraper, and some gasket maker.

All right, so we got the truck up in the air, we have our oil catch in place, along with some cardboard just in case. What's the first thing that we do?

Jeremy: First thing is we'll pop off the clips that are holding ABS wire to the rear end cover, get that up out of the way so we don't catch it with the pan or anything like that at all, and then just start removing the bolts.

Freddy: Easy enough.

We're going to leave one bolt loose on the top of the cover and then remove the rest so we can lift it forward a little bit and let it drain rather than removing the entire cover and making a big mess.

Jeremy: Okay, now we've got everything loosened up a little bit, when you're doing this you don't have to worry about dropping a bolt or anything. The new kit comes with all new hardware so you can just save this for another job, throw it in the trash, whatever you want to do.

Freddy: Cool.

We have all but one bolt out and now we just need to use a screwdriver or a pry bar to pry it away from the silicone and let it drain.

Jeremy: Here's where it can get messy.

Freddy: Now we'll remove the final bolt and remove the cover.

As you can see, there was a lot of gasket material left over on the differential housing, so we need to clean it off. We're going to use a gasket scraper, get it nice and clean, and then we can install the new cover.

Once you've scraped everything off, give it a nice wipe down with a microfiber rag or a lint-free towel. Make sure the surface is nice and clean.

Jeremy: Now we've got the whole gasket area cleaned, we're going to take a 5/16 by 18 tap, gonna run it in all the bolt holes just to make sure we get all the junk out of the threads and everything. That way, when we go to torque everything down, everything's going to be real accurate and clean in there.

So we're getting ready to put on our cover. One really cool feature about this I kind of wanted to show you, is they've got load bolts in here. What these do is they go up against the bearing caps. So when it's on, we can come here and you'll tighten these down just so it stays in place, comes in contact with this. That way it keeps everything structured, keeps it from deflecting at all, just gives it more rigidity and more strength.

Freddy: Cool.

Now we'll apply a nice bead of silicone all the way around the whole cover. We want to be in the very center of the cover and then go on the inside of the bolt holes to make a nice seal.

We're ready to put the cover on. We're going to get it nice and lined up and then install the bolts. Jeremy got all the bolts started. I'm going to tighten them down and then torque them to 15 foot-pounds, and torque them in a crisscross pattern. Now I'll torque them all to 15 foot-pounds.

Jeremy: Now that Freddy's got all the bolts torqued down to spec, what we're going to do is go ahead and tighten in these load bolts. We're going to put a little dab of silicone on them just before we run them in. What you want to do is run these in until they stop. Once they've stopped, we're going to torque them down to five foot-pounds.

Freddy: Torque the bolts to five foot- pounds.

Jeremy: Yeah, you want to be real careful with this. If you get any more than five, it could cause extra fatigue on the bearing caps, where they wear out a little bit faster.

Okay, now we're going to put the jam nuts on, go ahead and get these tight, torque them down to five foot-pounds.

Freddy: We can now install our magnetic drain plug with a 1/4" hex key.

It's now ready for fluid. We're going to put 75/140 fluid in it until it comes out of the fill hole. All right, and that's how you know it's filled, it's going to start coming out of the fill hole. That was about seven quarts. Now we can install the fill plug, then toque the fill plug to 20 foot- pounds and your installation's finished.

Now, there's no longer factory hardware for the ABS line to mount to, so we're going to zip tie it to the break line. Trim off the excess, then your installation's finished.

Jeremy: Okay, Freddy. So we've got this installed and everything's torqued to spec, we've got the ABS wire up out of the way. What do you think?

Freddy: You know, installation really wasn't that bad. I love the way it looks. It looks absolutely killer. When we get a lift on this thing, it'll look really awesome going down the road and we pretty much doubled the capacity of this differential. It will keep it nice and cool. I really think it's beneficial. Installation's not too bad, should only take you about an hour, maybe an hour and a half, and before you know it, you'll be heading off-road.