Ok, I know I'm probably gonna hear it for doing this, but this seems to be the only solution that is working. So, that said here is what I did.
Some of you know that my car was under water before I bought it. ( Literally) This was a Katrina flood car. It shows evidence of that every where, ( The wire harness wrap has disentegrated, and there is/was mud in every hole, and inaccessible nook and cranny the car has. Most of that was dealt with in the build. However when it came to the rear end I never considered that there may have been water in there. It has always been a little noisy since I've owned it, so I finally got tired of it and decided to remove the rear cover and give it a look.
MUD! Well mud mixed in w/ gear oil.
I drained the sludge and cleaned it out best I could and filled it w/ new clean gear oil, and now the thing was noisy as hell! I looked for some kind of additive to "quieten" the thing down, but couldn't find jack!. That is until I went to a friends house and his dad told me about how they used to throw sawdust in the old gearboxes and rear ends of the 40's era cars to quieten them down because they used straight cut gears "back in the day". Two weeks ago I decided to try it for myself. I know it sounds crazy, but I figured that the wood would eventually become a pulp, and one of the byproducts of pine is....oil ( I mean there is an oily residue in pine sawdust) So, I'm thinking once it becomes pulverized by the ring and pinion, it can't be any more harmful than a piece of paper in there. I drained about a pint of gear oil and added about a cup of pine sawdust I got from the catch bag on my table saw. Sealed that baby up, and took it for a test drive.
WAY quieter! Problem was, it only lasted about 2 days before the noise started getting louder again. So, I figured if a little was good, I'd keep adding sawdust until I get nothing from the rear end except the mildest hum.
I won't go into detail, since the process of trial and error has had the rear end opened 3 additional times now, but suffice it to say that the ratio of sawdust to gear oil is now 90% wood, w/ 10% oil just to keep everything a little slippery in there. I mean I'm not THAT dumb to put straight wood in there.
I got mixed feelings/ concerns as I report that I'm at about 300 miles now, post sawdust and the rear end hasn't made a noise yet. ( except for the clicking and ticking detailed a little later) The only thing I notice, ( and you'd have to tell me if you think it's a bad thing) is that I think I catch a whiff of wood smoke coming out from under the car every now and then. I knew that rear ends get hot, but not THAT hot. I mean it's not like there is internal combustion in there or anything. Now I'm afraid that my ratio of sawdust was too much sawdust, not enough gear oil. I got under the car after a drive last week end and the rear end was blazing hot! I can't even touch it w/ my hand! AND, it made this clicking and ticking noise like what metal makes as it cool down ( kinda like what exhaust does)
Somebody please tell me I didn't screw up a set of rear end gears
Do you think I can use those little fans you see on Cobra kit car radiators to blow on the rear end? Or maybe I can build some sort of ducting to blow on it instead. I know NASCAR cars have some kind of rear end cooler, but I think the wood/oil mixture will probably be too thick to flow through any regular style cooler.
Some of you know that my car was under water before I bought it. ( Literally) This was a Katrina flood car. It shows evidence of that every where, ( The wire harness wrap has disentegrated, and there is/was mud in every hole, and inaccessible nook and cranny the car has. Most of that was dealt with in the build. However when it came to the rear end I never considered that there may have been water in there. It has always been a little noisy since I've owned it, so I finally got tired of it and decided to remove the rear cover and give it a look.
MUD! Well mud mixed in w/ gear oil.
I drained the sludge and cleaned it out best I could and filled it w/ new clean gear oil, and now the thing was noisy as hell! I looked for some kind of additive to "quieten" the thing down, but couldn't find jack!. That is until I went to a friends house and his dad told me about how they used to throw sawdust in the old gearboxes and rear ends of the 40's era cars to quieten them down because they used straight cut gears "back in the day". Two weeks ago I decided to try it for myself. I know it sounds crazy, but I figured that the wood would eventually become a pulp, and one of the byproducts of pine is....oil ( I mean there is an oily residue in pine sawdust) So, I'm thinking once it becomes pulverized by the ring and pinion, it can't be any more harmful than a piece of paper in there. I drained about a pint of gear oil and added about a cup of pine sawdust I got from the catch bag on my table saw. Sealed that baby up, and took it for a test drive.
WAY quieter! Problem was, it only lasted about 2 days before the noise started getting louder again. So, I figured if a little was good, I'd keep adding sawdust until I get nothing from the rear end except the mildest hum.
I won't go into detail, since the process of trial and error has had the rear end opened 3 additional times now, but suffice it to say that the ratio of sawdust to gear oil is now 90% wood, w/ 10% oil just to keep everything a little slippery in there. I mean I'm not THAT dumb to put straight wood in there.
I got mixed feelings/ concerns as I report that I'm at about 300 miles now, post sawdust and the rear end hasn't made a noise yet. ( except for the clicking and ticking detailed a little later) The only thing I notice, ( and you'd have to tell me if you think it's a bad thing) is that I think I catch a whiff of wood smoke coming out from under the car every now and then. I knew that rear ends get hot, but not THAT hot. I mean it's not like there is internal combustion in there or anything. Now I'm afraid that my ratio of sawdust was too much sawdust, not enough gear oil. I got under the car after a drive last week end and the rear end was blazing hot! I can't even touch it w/ my hand! AND, it made this clicking and ticking noise like what metal makes as it cool down ( kinda like what exhaust does)
Somebody please tell me I didn't screw up a set of rear end gears
Do you think I can use those little fans you see on Cobra kit car radiators to blow on the rear end? Or maybe I can build some sort of ducting to blow on it instead. I know NASCAR cars have some kind of rear end cooler, but I think the wood/oil mixture will probably be too thick to flow through any regular style cooler.
