Evening all,

I have a small split in the nearside outer boot (just ahead of the inner clip) that has thrown out a bit of grease - no clicking from the outer cv joint on car-park lock tests, but on slow right hand bends there is a slight knocking which may or may not be the cv joint in question. I can't find any other play in joints, so, given that I need to fix the boot in any event, I'm going to replace the LH driveshaft as a first step. I'm happier to just replace the whole driveshaft for a few extra quid rather than mess around trying to secure boots etc and then have sod's law throw an inner failure at me a week later etc etc....

Given this, I have a part question(s). I can see that the original part is GKN badged, and I can also see that Britpart supply both an "own brand" (c £200) and a GKN branded part (c £300). Additionally I can see a Spidan (GKN 24396) remanufactured part available (Spidan is a GKN subsidiary). Here are the questions:

1. Does anyone know whether there is a difference between the Britpart own badged version and their "GKN" version?
2. Is the Britpart GKN version a remanufactured item (like the Spidan one) or a brand new item?
3. Is a GKN "official" remanufactured item as good as a new GKN item?
4. How much am I overthinking this?
5. Can anyone recommend a decent torque wrench for 400nm, or a torque multiplier or digital torque adaptor that I can use with a 140nm wrench? Cheaper better, as long as it's not total rubbish!

any pointers much appreciated! Cheers, J.