After a 2000 mile drive, my truck was showing signs of wear. Slight noise in all gears lead me to think throwout bearing, I was wrong...as it turns out, she swallowed and chewed up most of the first bearing from the input shaft on the trans. Has anyone had this happen or heard of this? Pics will come as well as a marlin crawler rebuild once I'm home again.

 

My truck ate up the input shaft bearing and chewed up the splines of the shaft because the PO didn't keep up with fluid level. By the time I got to the shop for a rebuild, the tech sent me pics and said I was lucky I didn't get left stranded somewhere. I considered going with a MC tranny but wasn't smart and went to a local tranny shop that was a little cheaper...bad idea; they had to wrench on it 3x over about an 8mo time span and finally got it right after getting me a different housing with all new internals - and it still makes slight input noise sometimes when I first put it in 5th in the morning but I haven't had any problems. So with the headache I experienced, i should definitely have gone with the Marlin tranny.

From what i read, its less common for the input shaft bearing to go than for the throwout bearing. Good luck.

 

The mechanic friend of mine was baffled the truck still moved, let alone drive with little to no problem other than noise. For the price difference, I will probably go with the rebuild kit as I am well versed in wrenchology. Stay tuned.

 

Update: based on the color of the fluid, I would say that the oil may be older than the rebuild claimed when I bought this one. PO wasnt exactly hands on with repairs. Spare tcase at home, opportunity knocks for a hearty trans with dual cases.

 

well i havent dug into mine yet...just got a new w56 yesterday from a junkyard..but the one thats in there right now sounds like theres something loose inside of it thats banging around...still shifts great, except reverse.