All-
I would have posted this in the driveline forum, but I wanted to keep this thread updated for someone searching down the line (it’d be helpful to someone like me if an updated diagnosis was always given in threads :))…
After removal, the flywheel looked fine on both the crank and clutch disc side with no obvious scratches or heat damage. The inside of the bell housing was also undamaged. The casting “freeze” plug was in place, and as new. It looked aluminum or stainless, and if it had have popped out and wedged in, that would be the exact noise I was hearing. I still can’t get enough mechanical advantage to turn the engine at the crank with a pry bar through offset positioned bolts in the crank face (& spark plugs out). But remember, the starter will turn it, and I can turn it prying the flywheel at the bell housing. Doing this produces a noise, I mentioned, but after further listening it is not the same scratchy scraping noise that spawned all this investigation- it is more of a “tight” turning sound.
Here’s what I have found after removing propeller/drive shaft, transmission, clutch, and flywheel:
Pressure plate fingers are shiny at the tips, and one is about 1/32” raised more than the others toward the TO bearing, or just enough to notice by running an index finger over them. It would cut you if you tried to make it, though;
TO bearing spins freely;
The clutch disc shows some uneven wear viewing its faces, but still has some ‘meat’ or disc material between its grooves extending from its center (though less at the ends). Looking at it on end, & unlike the new clutch kit disc, it has some squeezable separation between its sides exposing the rectangular flat springs inside; but they do not protrude outward. I have a replacement clutch kit.
So, would the (chipped at its 5 o’clock)
pilot bushing have made the metal scraping noise I was looking for? It has a small hang-nail sized piece of itself that has come off, but I did not find it when I removed the flywheel, and the bushing is going to be heck to get out. The main shaft of the transmission showed no evidence of wear.
I’m being cautious, but can (
should) I put just the flywheel on & turn the engine over with the starter? Just for clean everything & work-backwards elimination? This would be working under a HUGE, but somewhat warranted assumption that the noise was external to the engine. Or, should I treat this like a seized engine and wait a while?
Thank y’all for your advice!
