What Temp should the drive axles be at?

If the diffs run low of oil, below the senders they won't register. At least on my old freight shaker with rockwells. The best axles ever IMO. I noticed mine was not working, got out to find a pinion/yoke seal gone with very little oil left. As soon as I topped it off to get home temp came back up once sender was in oil again. So if mine stop workin you better believe I'm getting out to look. $1500 salvage chunks with me installing ain't no effen fun! All mine run bellow 200 unless loaded in really hot Mississippi weather. Which btw is hot as hell!

 

I do a pre trip everyday and check the gear boxes when I change the oil every month, so I'm not to worried about faulty guages. Besides I've driven dozens of trucks that never had trans or axle temp gauages and have never once had a failure due to low oil, come to think of it, I've only come across two worn diffs and both had many years and many miles under them.

 

Walton379 is right, I've had the same happen when a pitted housing developed a hole. My temps without coolers and running synthetic are usually about all the same, 180 to 200. I've been told by gear shops that your good up to 250 on transmissions, I would think this holds true for rears also. I have rockwell rears which are smaller in size than eatons, but seem to run cooler than my friends eatons, but this is not to say that one is better, just saying.

 

Yes only my opinion on quality. There is nothing wrong with eaton or spicer. I've heard horror storries about both of those but just storries. My w9 has eatons. Strangely enough they say spicer on em too..