hurray for gear whine!

the98stang

Active Member
Aug 12, 2005
2,408
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47
Clovis, CA
Well I got my gears about a week ago and they are whining. The weird thing is, my STOCK 3.27 gears whined before I had the new gears put in. The whine isn't terrible, but you can definetely hear it, and it sounds like it's coming from the rear. Tomorrow I'm taking it back to the mechanic and he's going to check the backlash. The whine only occurs from 2700 RPM's to 3000 RPM's. So far I have only noticed the noise while in second and third gear. Do you guys think maybe the gears aren't the problem since my car did the EXACT same thing at the same RPM's with my stock gears? Maybe it's the T45? Nontheless, the car is going in tomorrow to be looked at. I'll drive the mechanic around. Also, I should add, 75-140 Mobil 1 is in the diff, but the mechanic said friction modifier was not needed :shrug: . This is a reputable gear shop....
 
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You sure the whine isn't coming from the shifter? Not that I doubt your ability to determine where sound is coming from, but if the whining was there with stock gears, AND aftermarket gears, then perhaps it's something else.
 
OK...I drove the car a little bit more.

I hear a "whine/hum" in 2nd, 3rd, and 4th gear from 2700 RPM's to 3000 RPM's, then it stops. I could not test 5th gear, because I wasn't on the highway. And it SEEMS 1st gear does not make the noise, but it could be that my exhaust is too loud. The sound seems like it's coming from the rear of the car...that's why I assumed it was the gears. Do gears tend to whine ALL of the time, or can they whine during certain RPM's? I'm soo confused!

I'd also like to add the car has 64k miles. I'm not sure if the tranny oil has been changed yet so I'm going to do it ASAP....I don't think the previous owner did it...
 
Ok, its VERY unlikely tahts its the rear. They tend to whine under a "certain" load and at a "ceratin" MPH. Our 00 V6 whines, but only @ 45-50.....the rear end doesnt care what RPM your at. Its looking at load and friction to determine whine. And since 2-4th @ 2700-3K wont produce the same load, nor the same speed...I really dont think its your rear end. Its also very unlikely that when you change gears and it still whines at the exact same spot as the stock gears.

May want to check your tranny fluid :nice: . Im almsot 100% sure that its not your rearend.
 
hotmustang331 said:
Ok, its VERY unlikely tahts its the rear. They tend to whine under a "certain" load and at a "ceratin" MPH. Our 00 V6 whines, but only @ 45-50.....the rear end doesnt care what RPM your at. Its looking at load and friction to determine whine. And since 2-4th @ 2700-3K wont produce the same load, nor the same speed...I really dont think its your rear end. Its also very unlikely that when you change gears and it still whines at the exact same spot as the stock gears.

May want to check your tranny fluid :nice: . Im almsot 100% sure that its not your rearend.

Yea that makes sense...I'm going to change the fluid ASAP...
 
Sounds like what happened to me. It was my rear end bearings, though, and I went ahead and had the whole rearend rebuilt. I am now facing leakage because the pinion seal is torn up. I've already taken it back once for the leak, they said it was fixed. I am going to get another shop to tear it apart and do it right.
 
Yea it could be anything. But a tranny fluid change definatly wouldnt hurt..bet its never been changed. I bet it has something to do with the tranny, but you know cars lol....sometimes they defy logic. And I would still let the guy check blacklash since its probably free :nice: .

Man I just hope your tranny isnt reaching the end of its life....but im sure SVTtech will know more about that. I dont have a T-45 anyways, for all I know whine is common in those haha.
 
well if it did it stock, and does it with the new gears, you can count those out of the equation. i doubt even misaligned new gears would whine right off the bat.

now, is the whine related to speed(mph) or gear(rpm)?

if speed related, as in, it starts coming on at 40mph and doesnt go away till 70, then you have either bad rear bearings or wheel bearings. id check the latter, theyre cheap. take it to the place who installed the gears and tell em whats up, it whines, but is related to speed and not rpm, they will know what to look and listen for in a test drive.
 
I don't think this is related to speed because it does it from 2nd-fourth gear (possibly 5th....havn't tried yet) from 2700-3000 rpms. And I'm convinced the previous owner left the tranny fluid alone (I can assume this because the oil was BLACK and the coolant was BROWN! :nonono: :mad: ). Anyway I'm going to the shop tomorrow and hopefully they can fit me in. I'm going to watch the oil as it drains and watch for any metal particles. I think if I see some metal, I can assume the backlash is off. If not, I dunno what I can do? :shrug:
 
hotmustang331 said:
Yea it could be anything. But a tranny fluid change definatly wouldnt hurt..bet its never been changed. I bet it has something to do with the tranny, but you know cars lol....sometimes they defy logic. And I would still let the guy check blacklash since its probably free :nice: .

Man I just hope your tranny isnt reaching the end of its life....but im sure SVTtech will know more about that. I dont have a T-45 anyways, for all I know whine is common in those haha.


my T-45 whines for all of 2nd gear ( probally from all the powershifts :nice: ) no matter what RPM, has done that for atleast 20k miles now.

I would do what hotmustang331 said and change out the trans fluid and see if it gets any better. if not I would not worry about it because the only thing you can do to fix that noise is rebuild the tranny. so why not drive it untill it breaks :shrug: thats what I am doing.

BTW I think it's related to a input shaft bearing or some other main shaft bearing since it's all gears at a certian rpm. if it was in one or 2 gears ( like mine) then it could be gear damage, syncro damage ETC.
 
Well I took the car into the shop and they said the backlash was still set at .011 (or .0011, .11 ...forgot what he said). I saw the gear oil myself and there didn't seem to be any metal flakes in it. The mechanic also said he doubted it was the gears, since the whine occured during certain rpm's in each gear, and not one certain speed. So I'm thinking its not the gears.

I'm going to change the tranny oil ASAP and see if that helps any...
 
well in the rear you have axel bearings, pinion bearings, carrier bearings. if you backlash is good and the wear patter is good the chances of it being the ring and pinion are slim.

I would try running the car at those rpms on jack stands or lift, then with a stethoscope and try to locate the whine. to the rear or trans. this will at least give you piece of mind. it should be very obvioust where it is coming from once you do this.
 
hognutz said:
well in the rear you have axel bearings, pinion bearings, carrier bearings. if you backlash is good and the wear patter is good the chances of it being the ring and pinion are slim.

I would try running the car at those rpms on jack stands or lift, then with a stethoscope and try to locate the whine. to the rear or trans. this will at least give you piece of mind. it should be very obvioust where it is coming from once you do this.

Maybe I can do that at a shop...that seems very dangerous LOL. **Car falls off jack stands, and slams itself into the garage wall :nonono: **

I'm going to change the tranny fluid right now...I'll post results.