leaky 8.8

About a month ago I noticed there was gear oil leaking out of the driver's side of my recently installed 8.8. I tore it down and replaced the axle seals on both sides ( hell if it was already taken apart why not just replace both). The driver's side one went in pretty easily, but the pass. side seal took a lot of rubber mallet to get it in. Well, after driving back home from a Uwharrie trip I started to notice a rotational "grinding" ( like metal on metal ) noise coming from the left rear kind of intermittenly. I got home and noticed the left rear was leaking a hell of a lot of gear oil. I had lost about a quart ( 8.8 takes 3.5qs. ). Pulled the diff cover and every thing looked fine, no metal shavings anywhere which is what I half expected to find. So anyway, I'm going to tear it apart when I get back home from vacation and replace the wheel bearing and axle seal on the driver's side and see if that'll fix it. Question is-is there any chance I could have gotten a bad seal from NAPA the first time? Maybe I didn't push it in all the way? Some have suggested bent housing, but I tend to think that I would have noticed something like that the first thousand miles I drove with the 8.8 in. Also, any tips on pulling/replacing the wheel bearing? I just want this damn thing to quit leaking gear oil all over my rim, any suggestions?