grinding rear

95 country with 210,000 mi just started making a kind of rotating grinding noise from the right rear wheel area. Is this a wheel bearing starting to go bad? It only happens when making a turn. Any ideas, Buz.

Are we speaking of a dana 35?

buzxj check to see if your rear swaybar is rubbing on the rim. If you have a blocklift in the rear it lines the two up so they rub when turning.

Yes it is a dana 35, and the lift uses aal. I can't find anything that looks like it has been rubbing.

I have this exact same thing. Sounds like a rotating grinding.

likely it's a bearing since it happens when you turn and change the load on it.

Did any of you ever solve this problem?

Mine, 87 4X4 Wagoneer AW4, just starting making this noise, or a similar noise but only on sharp right turns if I gas it while completing the turn.

Thoughts? God I hope it's not the rear end gears or bearings.:shiver:

Oh, and mine is all stock, no mods, and 235R75 15" tires.

I've never had a truly worn out outer bearing, I've changed them when changing the seals just as insurance. When the outer seals start to leak, it's often from worn bearings.
Carrier bearings seem to make more noise in reverse than forward in my experience. Though they can change pitch when going around a curve or changing speeds.
Pinion bearings often change pitch rather abruptly when letting off the gas, one tone during coast and another during acceleration.
None of it is really earth shattering to fix.

If you've got oil in there it and a bearing going bad it won't take too long to see the problem. I noticed oil film on my rear window after driving on the highway when pinion took a dump. It didn't sound too good either by that time and I had about 230k miles on it at the time.

check the rear brake drums. i had a broken brake cable and the ends were rubbing in the inside of the drum.

ganoze said:

check the rear brake drums. i had a broken brake cable and the ends were rubbing in the inside of the drum.

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Under what driving conditions did yours make a noise?

Thanks everyone for the feedback on this, I am still looking for more feedback and ideas!

So far mine happens only on pretty sharp right turns either when going over a large bump in a driveway entrance where the rear end goes up and down a good 7" or more as it negotiates the bump, or when I am half way through the right turn already, and I take my foot off the brake peddle and give it enough gas to make the rear end lean to the left (Left = drivers side) a good bit as I accelerate which results in the right rear lifting up a bit more than if I take the turn gradually. Not sure yet if it makes the noise when the rear is elevated, or when its on its way back down, but the noise is very loud and obvious when it happens, lasts for 1 to 1.5 seconds while the rear is going up and down during the turn, and sounds somewhat like accelerating and turning aggresively in loose rocks in a paking lot.


I does not make any noise on gradual right turns, or left turns even with a bump in the turn yet, but the noise happened 5 times yesterday, 2 were deliberate to try and isolate the noise source and type. Since it does not make the noise any other times I doubt it is the drum brakes, I never heard bad shocks make this kind of noise before but Im wondering about the shocks. Closest thing I ever heard to it is ground up wheel bearings, or loose lug nuts on a turn! HMMMM! Time to check the lug nuts me thinks! But I doubt I will be that lucky.

Oh, and Merry Christamas, Happy Holidays to everyone.

Ecomike said:

Did any of you ever solve this problem?

Mine, 87 4X4 Wagoneer AW4, just starting making this noise, or a similar noise but only on sharp right turns if I gas it while completing the turn.

Thoughts? God I hope it's not the rear end gears or bearings.:shiver:

Oh, and mine is all stock, no mods, and 235R75 15" tires.

Click to expand...

on the non C-clip rear an outer wheel bearing will give you a fairly regular "clunk" about twice for every revolution of the wheel when it starts to give up. I would think based on "tight turn" and "giving it gas" that you would have a spider gear or carrier bearing going out. I have not experienced this personally, but I've had every other darn bearing go south in one axle or another with semi-floating axle shafts without said symptoms.

As always, I don't claim to know much other than how to break things and the related sounds that haunt me often provide the necessary clues for others to avoid the carnage:wierd:

--Shorty

Well I am about to get started taking a Look-See to try and isolate the source of the noise. I don't think mine is brake related. I do think my vent hose on the axle is loose again, it has come loose before, and there are signs of leaking differential fluid from the ventnipple on top of the axle assy.

I checked last night to see if I could finally determine what rear end differential I have, seems I have front and rear Dana 44s with the NP242 transfer case. :sunshine:It is the 10 bolt pattern and looks exactly (as far as I can tell) like the Dana 44 pictures at Yucca mans web site. This is my 87 Wagoneer ltd (mid sized) with the 4.0 engine stock, 4x4. I had not had any problems with the drive train since I bought her 3 years ago, and had been preoccupied with Renix issues since the purchase so I had not really paid any attention to the drive train until now.

I have never serviced an axle / differential before so I could use some guidance on this. I bought a diff cover gasket, planning to drain, inspect and refill the differential today for starters. Is GL-5 with limited slip differential additive the correct refill?

Make sure it isn't just a bad universal joint telegraphing its noise.

Ecomike said:

I checked last night to see if I could finally determine what rear end differential I have, seems I have front and rear Dana 44s with the NP242 transfer case. :sunshine:It is the 10 bolt pattern and looks exactly (as far as I can tell) like the Dana 44 pictures at Yucca mans web site.

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Should be a Dana30 up front.

All dana axle's have 10 cover bolts.........

RyanM said:

Should be a Dana30 up front.

All dana axle's have 10 cover bolts.........

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The front cover plate looks exactly like my rear cover plate, and the rear is a Dana 44. I pulled the cover plate today, confirmed the photo and gasket match, drained the oil. Got the following numbers off the tag:

8953005004
3.54 46-13
So I finally know what my gearing is, its 3.54:1

Does anyone else have an OEM Dana 44 on the front drive shaft, 4x4?

Does the Dana 30 cover plate look like the Dana 44 cover plate? Yucca does not have a picture of the Dana 30 front gear cover.

Matthew Currie said:

Make sure it isn't just a bad universal joint telegraphing its noise.

Click to expand...

Well the front drive shaft u-joint on the front side of the axle is a little tiny bit loose. I also have an issue with the grease fitting on it, as the grease gun nozzle can't reach the fitting, so it seems it never got greased.

I also found a missing bolt that holds the exhaust pipe up at the cat converter, so there is some slop and play there too.

The rear end seems solid as a rock. Could not find any issues with it except low fluid, about 1/4 low, or 3/4s full. It had leaked earlier this year when the vent hose got knocked loose replacing a brake line.

Is your exhaust pipe rubbing your leaf springs by any chance? I had this happen (worse with acceleration/turns) and thought I had blown out my wheel bearing.

Sure enough, I have Dana 44's on my front and rear axles! Seems I lucked out as it was my first jeep purchase and at the time I had no idea what axle was what, I just wanted a usable, servicable DD XJ.

http://www.yuccaman.com/jeep/gear1.html

Shows the Dana 44 as a front axle option too!

Seems I got lucky and got front and rear Dana 44's on my 87, Wagoneer ltd, 4x4. I payed $1,500 for her in 2004, one of the rare ones!party1:

Ecomike said:

The front cover plate looks exactly like my rear cover plate, and the rear is a Dana 44. I pulled the cover plate today, confirmed the photo and gasket match, drained the oil. Got the following numbers off the tag:

8953005004
3.54 46-13
So I finally know what my gearing is, its 3.54:1

Does anyone else have an OEM Dana 44 on the front drive shaft, 4x4?

Does the Dana 30 cover plate look like the Dana 44 cover plate? Yucca does not have a picture of the Dana 30 front gear cover.

Click to expand...

YIKES!!!!

I can slide my transmission from side to side! I was retesting my U-Joints on the rear drive shaft and noticed some play in the trany mount I thought, so I got aggressive and suddenly found my tranny sliding easily from side to side.

I need a closer look, need to clean it up degrease it some first, might need a new tranny mount, but for sure it is missing the bolts that bolt the tranny to the tranny mount!

Anyone know, or a have a source to look up that bolt size & spec???????????

:helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme::helpme: PLEASE!
I need the length, size and thread count to buy.