Where will what hurt your car? Having the smaller spare on the front? Third paragraph of my last post...

Talking to dealers generally gets you nowhere. They're all scum with IQ's of a goldfish. Now, if you physically go in to a dealership and ask to talk to one of their senior techs, and ask HIM about it, THAT might get you somewhere.

Did he check the transfer case itself, and not just the fluid? While the fluid of a component can usually give you an indication of what's going on inside of it, it doesn't always tell the whole story.