THE DEVIANT

Please help before I set fire to my MY94 WRX and drive it off the Forth Road Bridge!. Before spending £900 on a new Helix clutch and flywheel there was an intermittant grating/grinding noise after gearchanges. Sounds like a synchro chewing, but there is no vibration through gearknob, and it can do it for ages or split second after gearchanges. Only happens in 2nd,3rd + 4rth.Now after new clutch the noise is back. I replaced the fork spring yesterday in the hope this was the (inexpensive)problem. There is about 15mm play in pedal so that seems ok, and the pedal is nice and light. But the bearing is now slightly noisy again at idle and low speeds etc till I dip the clutch. It can go away for minutes then comes back, but I suppose that is down to component temperatures.

Thanks

Gallon of Optimax and cheap lighter on standby.

THE DEVIANT

Petrol can lid now unscrewed and flung away, ready to douse the beast.

DaveW

Not wanting to see (well hear about) a Scooby go up in flames,

Have you tried changing the gearbox oil?

DaveW.

THE DEVIANT

Oil changed to silkolene after clutch change. I think it's external rather than internal as I cannot feel anything through the gearknob/pedals when it happens, but then again I'm not very good at diagnosing mechanical faults!

Leslie

I had a Helix clutch and flywheel fitted a while ago. The gearbox was filled with Castrol Syntrax afterwards which is what it had before. I have noticed a noise similar to yours as well on the overrun in the lower gears. This was not there before the clutch change. I thought it may have been vibration of a heat shield or something since like your it seems to be outside the box although I can't be sure of that.

Seems a strange coincidence, I have not been too worried about it but maybe there is someone who can tell us what the cause is. My car is a MY94 STI.

Les

STWEST

Have possibly a similar problem with MY98, always when starting from cold in 2nd/3rd gears after I have changed gear and the clutch is back to its normal position, lasts maybe 1-2 seconds, metallic sort of scraping noise, can only hear it when the window is open. No noticeable problems with the clutch otherwise.

Interested to see what conclusion is drawn and whether it would apply to my car. Car has done 74000, last gearbox oil change at 60000.

Cheers

THE DEVIANT

Thanks for the replies chaps. I spoke to a guy today who reckons I should check the gear linkage as these are prone to do funny things, so fingers crossed it's something relatively cheap!

It is a metallic grating noise as STWEST describes it only worse on mine.

Petrol can lid found and replaced. For now!!!!!!!

STWEST

Hope you get it sorted out, if you find an answer please post it just in case I need to go down a similar road sometime.

Cheers