St185 drive-train problem

[tometom]

Hi,

I have recently purchased a st85 jdm import, unrego'd and with some damage, the guy had hit a gutter and run over a sign . The front right hand side took the most of the impact f***in the wheel, and bending the lower control arm all of which was relatively simple to replace. The sign though that was another matter, it hit the front bar (only cracking it in 2 places) and then proceed to damage the 2 cross members, crush the exhaust and dint the rear cross member. After pruchaseing a half cut and swaping out all the damaged front end components i took it for a test run (had to use one of those space saveing wheels) all seemed fine. So i then proceeded to remove and repair the rear cross member, all done no problems with that really.

Now heres the catch, i took it for another drive today, and when ever i change down gears i get a loud grinding sound coming from the drivetrain some where, my first thought was that the clutch had gone but now im not to sure. Rolling down my driveway and releaseing the clutch produces the same sound yet slower(if that makes any sense) a kind of ticking.

Any help hints or things that i could try to further track down this problem would be much appreciated as at the moment im out of ideas.
thx in advance
tom

[spectral]

it could have easily damaged the clutch fork, its quite close to the front/back crossmember.

[oldcorollas]

are you still using the (differenty sized) space saver?

why did you need to use it before?

if you are, it could be from one of the diffs, or... it could be from the gears themselves in the gearbox..

you sound very keen.. sounds like the car was/is rooted

[tometom]

hmm ive had a look at the fork and it seems fine, the problem only happens when i shift down, i can shift up aggressively as i want and theres no problem, it doesnt crunch going it the gear only when i release the clutch.

had to use the space saver wheel as one of the alloys that i bought it with was bent, at the hub!

all in all this beast only owes me about $8000

it frustrating ive repaired all the other damage pretty much ready to go for a roadworthy, just this problem to sort out. hopefully no others turn up.

[oldcorollas]

so it is road speed related, and not gearbox speed related?
does it always do it?
is it only when you are taking your foot off the clutch pedal to disengage the clutch?

does it do it with the clutch pedal pushed in and car rolling?

what are the exact conditions toi make the noise....

is it ticking or continuous grinding? or both?

[tometom]

AH HA

Fixed it, turns out i was a little overenthusiastic in my repair of the rear cross member, i had bashed flat the divet where the tailshaft goes into the diff, so when ever the engine decelerated hard the tail shaft would drop and rub on the cross member. Fixed it properly this time and alls good. thx for all the imput and ideas

[SilverGhost]

Good to hear its fixed. One thing to note however is that play in the rear setup like you describe may point towards a rooted rear diff mount. As I said it may, or may not. But since youve gone to all this effort it probably wouldnt hurt to check out.

Good to hear another 185 back on the road!