Sounds to me like the pilot bearing. He said the noise is there with the clutch "out." TO bearing would noise w/cluthch "in." At least that is my experience...

 

I had an old Dodge dart with the same symptoms. It would rattle in neutral with the clutch out but not with the clutch in. I figured it was probably either the input bearing or the pilot bearing. I sold the POJ before I had a chance to find out though.

I have read that the crank can be bored out to accept a ball or needle pilot bearing. Can this be done without pulling the engine/crank? Is there a kit for this. The bronze pilot bushing seems to be a weak point.

I can see where the t/o would cause extra wear and even damage to the pilot sleeve it rides on but surely the operator would nonice the noise way before this. But then some people will endure the noise until something major breaks, usually at high speed.

Edwin

 

On our trucks the pilot bearing is in the flywheel. You just have to remove the flywheel and take it to the machine shop to get it bored for a ball type of pilot bearing.

 

The pilot bearing versus pilot bushing argument has been kicked around on dozens of websites.

I go for the bushing.

Reason being, when a roller-bearing gets hot, for whatever reason, it melts the grease out of it; then, it seizes up, spins on the input shaft of the transmission, and really buggers it up, necessitating transmission being tore down to replace the shaft.

I have seen bushings in really bad shape, yet do no damage to the transmission.

You can drive a long ways with a bad pilot bushing; you will most likely have to call a wrecker with a bad pilot bearing.

 

Depends how bad the pilot bushing gets.... I have seen a bad pilot bushing completely destroy an NV4500..... not common, but any wobble in the input shaft is a bad thing for the tranny.

When the clutch starts slipping that can be due to tranny fluid comming out of the input shaft seal and drenching the clutch. You will probably be able to driv it home in that condition but the tranny will already be done for.