Hi, I've been lurking for quite a while... it was a busy semester at school.
My 89 Dakota convertible just started giving me problems tonight.
The rear differential seemed to suddenly start crapping out on me. It still
drives alright as of now (though now that its parked in my driveway, I'm not
taking it anywhere soon!) It started grinding and clunking badly just
tonight. In the past few days it just started making different slight
grinding noises when I would take significant right turns (especially at
speed). The grinding was just starting to become audible over the driveshaft
howl... and tonight when I started driving, it made several clunking noises
coupled with a much louder grinding. I drove it the remaning few miles to my
destination and then 7 miles home and it started smoking. I looked under
there when I parked it, and it was dripping (one drop every minute or so)
and was audibly boiling. The whole diff case was hot; the dripping and
boiling sound was coming out the front.
In a few minutes I'm going to pop the cover off and take a look (no I havn't
done that yet). What I'm considering is going with an Auburn posi as a
replacement. Can anyone tell me if thats a good idea or a bad idea? Should I
not be assuming that it will drop right in? Are there better options...
should I not go to posi? I've never done rear-end work before but I need to
learn and I've got the manuals. I have to do this fast; this is my main
vehicle... (on my Dart I'm still workign on the camshaft, heads, intake,
etc). BTW, the truck is a pre-mag 3.9L auto 4x4, currently not posi. To my
knowledge its never been rebuilt... and its got 226,000 miles on it. Pretty
sure its a 3.21 ratio (I'm about to go make certain of that). Also, what
distributors would you suggest? From a quick search online, National
Drivetrain offers the Auburn posi for about $330.
Thanks in advance for your help!
Don
89 Dakota Convertible 4x4
74 Dart Sport 340
CT
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