Ok so I have to say the title to this thread could not have been more fitting for I found once I got the diff casing opened up. For reasons beyond my comprehension, the bolts that attach the ring gear to the carrier came loose and backed themselves out. I had five bolts lying in the bottom of the casing and it's what punched the holes in the cover. I can't even begin to understand how that even happened. I had thread lock on them and they were run down tight. The only thing i can figure is the bolts i used were out of the rebuild kit I bought and were slightly different than the OEM bolts. So, I had the five lying on the bottom and every single one of the remaining bolts were backed halfway out. Amazingly enough the ring gear didn't have any damage to it. How that it is Im not sure. The pinion gear however was not so lucky, it does have a damaged tooth but not so much in the vital area where it grabs the ring.I mean it doesn't look great but it's not all that bad either. I must have stood there for the better part of an hour turning those gears and listening for any grinding noises or seeing if it would catch. I cleaned up the gnarled edge and after long consideration decided to put it back together and see what happens. I couldn't see wasting the ring and pinion I just bought without at least giving it another try. I figured if it happens again I'll just use it as an opportunity to upgrade to the full 8.8. So anyways I put it all back together and let it run on the lift for about 25 minutes and everything seemed to sound and function ok. I then dropped the lift down and put the wheel rollers under them to add some load on them and again they seemed to be fine. I went ahead and drove it home last night and then to work this morning. The only thing I noticed is an ever so slight howl at around 40 mph but it goes away when you drop below 40 or go above 40 which I'm really not sure I understand because It's all together right and the backlash is good. We will just have to see how it goes.