Thanks Paul for the great technical reference. My brother and I were able to knock this out in about four hours, could've been faster if we knew exactly where dad keeps his tools.

Here's what's perplexing: While my leak was substantial enough to have caused a quite a mess over time, it seems as if the seal was in pretty good shape. Also, it almost appears as if the gear oil was leaking out through the middle of the output shaft, past the attachment bolt, into the CV joint cavity. From there it was flung out through the flange seal? It seems unlikely but I found more fluid inside the CV joint than would be suspected, and the grease was in good shape (hadn't somehow degraded into a fluid) It seems the only thing that keeps gear oil from escaping into the CV joint is a tapered shoulder on the attachment bolt, and it wasn't that tight when I pulled it off. Just a thought...(I added a bit of high temp sealant there)

What was still most amazing to my brother the helicopter pilot was the fact that the drive shaft was made of carbon fibre.

Andy
'98 A8
'87 Targa

per the Bentley, steel from '99 on. I guess cost would be the only reason to abandon such a weight savings.

they replaced it when hunting for my problem that I still have...