[Jason]

'kin ell, it all seems to happening at once. I have a problem where I seem to have what sounds like a weel bearing sort of droning noise coming from the front. In the past (on other FWD cars) wheel bearing noises got louder going round left or right corners depending on which side had gone.

This seems to be a bit different though, All is as normal when accelerating or driving but if I let the throttle off it makes the droning noise. Same if I depress the clutch or put into neutral (so seems it's not gearbox related)

I'm thinking wheelbearing myself but does this scream something else to you? How do you work out if it is a wheelbearing if it hasn't completely collapsed?

Thanks.

[stocker]

jack up the front end, place a hand on top of the wheel and a hand at the bottom of the wheel and make a push / pull notion, if your bearing is loose or worn you will feel some movement if the bearing isn't worn / loose you won't feel any movement

[Jasen]

Not too familiar with Jimny's but do they have the vacuum operated hubs that often play up? Could be that the hubs are locking and turning the diff? (Noise might be happening under acceleration too but more noticeable under deceleration due to engine noise not masking the sound?)

Or I could be waaaaay off the track..... lol

[Jason]

Thanks Stocker - jacked it up, there's no play vertically so seems it's not the wheel bearing.

All 4WD stuff seems to be working as normal. I have now tightened the fan belt so it's not squeaking and this seems to have strangely cured the droning noise. Very weird. I'm wondering if the engine was sort of half stalling due to fan belt slip and that was the juddering. And now I can't remember what it felt like before and I'm over analysing everything now and hearing things that aren't even there.

Had a good poke about underneath and I think I'm at the point where I need to spend some $$ if I want to keep it (which I do) There's about 2" of play at the steering wheel and the play seems to be coming from a box. Steering box is it? And I think the shocks are original 10 years old. Ball joints look ok but most of the bushes look a bit farked.

It handles like a boat on mushrooms even on a good day.

I'm thinking of going for it and doing the steering box, and a lift kit with new shocks and poly bushes and that should tighen everything up.

[stocker]

probably not a bad idea... while your at the wheel bearing... i'd be one for greasing it up and resealing the hub's while your there. call it preventative maitenence...

[Jason]

OK, it seems like the wheel bearings are not the problem. This has got a bit worse over the weekend making it a bit easier to identify it. What was a droning sound is now a definate vibration and happens in all gears and in neutral. Worse at low speeds, and is in time with vehicle speed, not engine speed. In fact I can stop the engine and coast to a stop and the noise is still there. It seems to go away over a certain speed but that speed is increasing as the problem gets worse. Once it goes I can slow down again and it's gone but comes back once I stop and pull away again.

I had a look underneath and there seems to be rotational play in the propshaft. Is this normal? Will try and get a pic up.

Thanks,
Jason

[Jason]

[gympzook]

I dont have a Jimny, but it sounds a lot like a universal joint is rooted. Had same problem on Sierra. Started off sounding like droning exhaust, then vibration got worse and worse. New Uni joint was around $40 for Sierra, so its a cheap fix.

[shep]

worn brake pads, the thingo will be rubbing. the tailshaft is supposed to turn

[Jason]

I'm not sure that the brake pads would cause the level of vibration I'm getting. It gets louder and louder up to about 50kmh to the point where you'd have to shout above it. I've looked in the Jimny service manual and it's saying that vibration would be caused by a prop shaft out of true.

There's play in the shaft and when I grab it and twist it back and forth I'm hearing the same sort of clunking noise that I get at low speeds, as speed increases the clunking turns to a drone and then a vibrating at higher speeds.

[shep]

pads wont cause a vibration. front or rear tailshaft? grab the bit that goes into the transfer case and see if there is any movement.
i missed the photo in my first post and i would be looking at either the uni or the bearing on the transcase.
a leaking seal sort of points to the trans case bearing having a bit of play in it.

[Jason]

Thanks.

That's the rear. Photo taken from right hand side so rear is towards the left. It happens in 2WD (rear) and 4WD. I thought that too with the fresh leak.

Am I looking for rotational movement or fore/aft movement?

[Jason]

Oh, ok I see. up/down bearing play perpendicular to the shaft right?

[Jason]

No play in the shaft as far as I can tell. And strangely enough the noise and vibration has now gone away. It all started after a bit of an offroad trip and I'm wondering if I dislodged something and now it's seated itself properly again. While it was bad I looked into how to remove the transfer case and it started with "remove the ehaust system..." so it's booked into a place on Monday and I'm in half a mind to cancel, or to just say to have a look.

[Jason]

Ok, finally got to the bottom of this. The leaking is from the switch on the transfer case, the short prop shaft between the gearbox and transfer case had a seized uni-joint. Because the shaft enters the transfer case at an angle it was causing the shaft to kick up when it rotated to the point where it wouldn't turn at that angle, if that makes sense.

[cairns27]

Mine did the same thing driving through Mareeba the other day.

I thought I'd done a diff, so put it in a workshop, was just that top uni, they don't have a grease nipple in them.

He reckons he sourced one with a nipple,but I havn't checked.

bye

[cairns27]

aw yea $130.oo, I was wrapped.

bye

[Teracis]

So it was a uni after all!

Meanwhile I just destroyed a uni trying to put it in, and then got the second one in perfectly but thought I'd unbalanced the shaft as when I drove around I got a pretty bad vibration...

So I was driving along thismorning trying to work it out, took the grease nipple off the uni, drove, put it back on, and as I put it back on I thought FRONT HUBS!

So I unlocked the front hubs, problem went away...

Which also says to me I have a problem in the front end of my sierra, I'll take the front prop shaft out, lock the hubs and go for a drive to see if it's shaft or axles.

Vibrations can be a bugger to find eh!