Hello, I just bought an '83 GSL with 30K km on a rebuilt engine to a) learn how to drive stick and b) start a restoration project. Anyway the car is definitely fun to drive and I love it already. I do have a problem, whenever I decelerate there is a chirping noise that I haven't been able to figure out. It only happens when I'm in gear and decelerating (never in neutral). Any ideas what you guys think it could be?

Thanks in advance,

Luis

 

Rotational chirping sound that's related to the speed the vehicle is traveling? I would check the U-joints as a starting point.

 

Agreed. That happened on the REPU. It didn't vibrate much. However broken needle bearings were falling out.

 

Hi Dan and Jeff,

Thanks for te replies, the friend I test drove the car with before buying it also thinks it may be the U-joints so I'll take a look at them tomorrow afternoon. What worries me is that the noise only happens when the car is in gear (i.e if I rev it up in neutral and let go of the accelerator it doesn't happen) regardless of how fast I'm going. Another friend suggested a bad throw-out bearing but I'm leaning more towards the u-joints.

Luis

 

Well can you replicate the sound without the vehicle moving? Need more details to narrow it down for you.

 

Welcome to the forum and the Darkside. In my sig line you will find links to the online FSMs, carb manual etc.

The u-joints on the later 1st gens aren't replaceable, but a good driveshaft shop can replace them with Dodge joints. Much cheaper than a new replacement shaft and the Dodge joints can be lubed.
.
.
.
.
.

 

whoa what?? the u joints on later 1st gens are not replacable??? How would you replace them with a dodge joint then?

 

The earlier shafts had the standard old style replaceable joints held in place with circlips. On the later ones, they need to be machined to remove.

 

I am 100% certain I can't replicate the noise without having the car move (I've tried and tried and failed)

 

79-82 are replaceable....83-85 are not. (i think)

 

If it were your u-joint you would feel a vibration along with whatever noise you hear. Without a doubt. The kind of noise you are getting usally comes from your ring and pinion in your differential. This is true of all cars not just rx7's

If your car doesnt make this noise when you operate the clutch it isnt the pilot or throwout bearing.

If you dont feel a vibration it for sure is not your u-joint. These usally do not make any noise when they go bad with the exception of a clunking, and vibration.

Id bet the bank its your differential.

 

Hey hey now, I have ran into many u-joints making squeaking noises at lower speed with no sign of vibration until highway speeds and other times even than it's not extremely apparent. The best bet is to start with the easy item which is the u-joints if the problem still exists after that than dig deeper...

 

I am not saying don't check the u-joint if your going under the car you should as a matter of course. But what he is discribing here it is highly unlikely that is the source of the noise. He has the noise only when he is decelerating. The u-joint would make noise all the time. Also he has said nothing about any vibrations.

Also if you check some trouble shooting guides a chirping sound while decelerating is listed as the ring and pinion in the differential.

Let us hope im wrong and he does find out that it is just the u-joint, a much easier and cheaper fix that messing around with the differential.

 

Thanks for all the help everybody, I had also thought it might be the diff but I'm really hoping it isn't. I'll raise it up as soon as I get home from work and check the u-joints for play and take it from there.

 

First off I'd like to thank everybody for their help. I got under the car Friday evening and did some thorough investigating and my noises turned out to be due to a bad u-joint (Dan you're the man) I managed to get a used driveshaft and swapped it over and the noises are gone (unfortunately I had to get someone to do it because the garage is full of my wife's things but that's a different story). Now I'm in the process of clearing out the garage and getting the car under cover so I can start working on it

Cheers,

Luis

 

No problem glad I could help.