need4speed
Veteran Member
- Joined
- May 4, 2004
Last month, I noticed a characteristic "clunkety-clunk" coming through the steering wheel, whenever I turned-right, and accelerated. I knew that the inner-cv boot was torn, for as long as I remember (I bought the car in late 2003, one previous owner). I've been re-packing the CV joint every couple of years, and basically waiting to hear symptoms - and since they finally arrived I decided to replace.
Compared to the cost of a new CV joint (and the boot clamp tool), replacing the entire axle seemed like the best option. My local O'Reilly's had a new one in-stock, so I got that, for $75. The new axle was about 2/3 the diameter of the old one, but otherwise, pretty much identical.
I installed it, following the procedure in the Bentley. It was pretty messy, but since I've had the old one off several times for other work, the job was familiar to me. (it's a manual, so I did not have to disconnect the trans mount). Since the inner fasteners on the replacement were Allen screws, and the old fasteners were 12-point, I was not sure how much to torque them. I used the value in the Bentley anyway.
The new axle fixed the clunkety-clunk, and I'm certain of that.
However, in 1st and 2nd, (maybe 3rd), at around 3800 rpm, I get this loud, resonant sort of booming noise, coming through the floor, and it sounds like it's coming from the location of the transaxle. I went back under the car, and verified that the ball joint is still snug, etc.
What I found was that there's a streak of grease on the heat-shield, (as if a small amount of the CV grease was flung out of the joint at high-speed), right at the mating line between the CV joint and the transmission collar. I also found that the axle itself, has a lot of radial play. About 1 cm. Though the bolts are all nice and tight, and the wheel itself has no play. I was careful to follow the correct procedure to tighten the 12-point castle nut precisely. So this radial play is the inner and outer CV joints, and the axle kind of floats between them. I don't know if the old axle did that.
Is this axle bad? Or did I do something wrong when I installed it? Or is this normal?
Compared to the cost of a new CV joint (and the boot clamp tool), replacing the entire axle seemed like the best option. My local O'Reilly's had a new one in-stock, so I got that, for $75. The new axle was about 2/3 the diameter of the old one, but otherwise, pretty much identical.
I installed it, following the procedure in the Bentley. It was pretty messy, but since I've had the old one off several times for other work, the job was familiar to me. (it's a manual, so I did not have to disconnect the trans mount). Since the inner fasteners on the replacement were Allen screws, and the old fasteners were 12-point, I was not sure how much to torque them. I used the value in the Bentley anyway.
The new axle fixed the clunkety-clunk, and I'm certain of that.
However, in 1st and 2nd, (maybe 3rd), at around 3800 rpm, I get this loud, resonant sort of booming noise, coming through the floor, and it sounds like it's coming from the location of the transaxle. I went back under the car, and verified that the ball joint is still snug, etc.
What I found was that there's a streak of grease on the heat-shield, (as if a small amount of the CV grease was flung out of the joint at high-speed), right at the mating line between the CV joint and the transmission collar. I also found that the axle itself, has a lot of radial play. About 1 cm. Though the bolts are all nice and tight, and the wheel itself has no play. I was careful to follow the correct procedure to tighten the 12-point castle nut precisely. So this radial play is the inner and outer CV joints, and the axle kind of floats between them. I don't know if the old axle did that.
Is this axle bad? Or did I do something wrong when I installed it? Or is this normal?
