1999 Chevy Camaro 3.8 Manual transmission

For quite some time (about 6 months) I’ve had an annoying noise and vibration in my driver side rear axle. It gets louder at higher speeds and is still present when I’m accelerating and when im coasting in gear or neutral with or without the engine. I’ve checked the fluid and it fine, I took it to a mechanic and he said It’s not the rear wheel bearings and says he thinks its something in the differential. Has anyone ever done any work on the rear differential or gotten any work done back there? What was wrong and how much did it cost you to get it fixed? Any suggestions as to what it may be???

 

i had a random grinding noise it would come and go and i fried my spider gears i spent about 1400 in parts but mine was a drastic upgrade

 

^^^ yep thats what it sounds like. one to many one sided burnouts.lol keep an eye out for a posi at the local wrecking yards, preferably low miles. then just switch the whole thing.

 

well that exactly do i need to replace if the spider gears are going bad? can i just replace the gears or do i need to replace the whole rear axle? didn't realize burnouts were that bad for the rear end.

 

when doing a burnout with a open rearend the spider gears double the speed of the spining tire. that means the little spidy gears are doing a lot of work and turning quite fast. u need to be a experianced mechanic with the proper tools to set a third member in the rearend. i dont mess with em because it just takes being off by very very little bit and the unit will go in a short time. again i would check the local yards and see what they have and at what cost so u know what choises u have and the cost of them. i know a shop will hit u hard in the pocket.

 

you can have someone replace the spiders gears themselves or you can if you have the knowledge but like craby said.... screw up by a hair and the whole thing goes bad soon down the road.... or you can drop whole rear axle and replace it but if your going through the trouble of doing the gears might wanna do bearings too

 

So after about a years of dealing with this annoying, slowly increasing vibration and noise emitting from my differential i finally broke down and took it to a garage. after doing some inspecting they determined it was the bearings in the differential causing the problem. they installed a complete differential bearing kit @ $167.66, the 2 axle bearings @ 64.88, wheel seals @ 11.36 with 8 hours of labor @ $672.00 grand total after taxes = $987.38.

But guess what, the sound is gone and my Camaro is a smooth ride once more.

 

Buy some diff oil and some rtv sealant and take that diff cover off and check for chipping. Also with the rear end on the jack stands lift up and down on your tire see if it has play. If it's got play and your diff gears are fine then your bearings are shot.

 

good deal, lol, well not so good on the pricetag but even that is about right. glad to hear you got it fixed.

 

I have the same sounds (2000 Z28).
I will do this inspection and diff oil today.
Thank you for this thread.