dga

Have a '86 944 turbo; I heard a noise, sometimes, like clicking around my axles. Seemed to be present when under mild or more acceleration and sometimes was not. No obvious visual problems. I think its the CVs.

I removed the CVs and one was had crease that was almost like water and in another the bearings were ok but the surface on which they move had some "dents". The ***** can move within a small channel and that channel has a dent.

Can it be that caused or causes the 'clicking' people say occur with bad CVs?

I already ordered one new CV assembly (keeping the other 3 though re-greased).

Any thoughts?

rlm328

A CV joint is basically a cage with ***** inside, when it gets worn the tolerances between the cage and the ***** get loose. So there is movement between them. The ***** and the cage cause the clicking noise when they take up the slack in the tolerances when going from acceleration to deceleration and vise versa.

MAGK944

If they start “clicking” cleaning and repacking with fresh grease then fit them back by swapping them around usually doubles their life as long as the boots are good. If you do replace them forget any except GKN/Loebro cv’s and clock the axles properly.

dga

What do you mean clock the axles properly? I am going to replace one of the CVs (its the one near the right rear tire, ordered from Pelicanparts). I think the new CV should go by the wheel as I understand that gets slightly more abuse. On the other side should I flip around the CV (putting the CV that was connected to the wheel to be to the transmission)? Its symmetric right, so I just have to install it reversed?

MAGK944

They are symmetrical so clean, repack and flip them both around so all the bearings ride on an unworn part of the cv. Clocking gives you a bit more articulation, helps prevent binding and “clicking” especially if your car is not stock height. Worthwhile wyit and really takes minimal extra effort so why not, plus it likely increases the life of your cv’s in the long term.

Nashvegas

Same thing / noise with my 86 944 Turbo now too. I took mine off and saw wear marks inside, but nothing that looked awful.

My grease -- I think -- dried up after 33 years. It was just ... not in the untorn boots anymore. Car only has 40K on it so go figure. And I was getting noise.

I ordered new axles 2 weeks ago, waiting on shipment and having an axle swap party in a few weeks when they arrive (had to come from Germany... I got a deal on genuine).

Stephencs601

click click click

Breakaway944

I have heard this many times. I assume you are talking about the actual cv joints. I noticed mine are not symmetrical and was hoping to find out why. These axles are from a '91 cab.
I do not know the proper names of the different parts of the cv joint so excuse the wrong terminology.
If you look at the picture below of the inner part of the joint, with the splines, you will notice one is flat (right) and one is slightly raised (left) - like a built in washer.

Here is a top view. The one on top has the "built in washer" and the bottom one is flat.

I included the shaft with the green dot to see if anyone knows if it is OE.
Here is a picture of the outer ring of the joint where it has a 951 part number on it, making me think it is OE

I noticed the difference when I tried a dry fit and some of the joints were having trouble-binding-when trying to install on the shaft. On closer inspection I noticed the asymmetric properties. The joints go on smoothly and easily when part with the built in washer is pointed inward but binds slightly if it is pointed outwards.
Is this normal? Did the axles change for '91? Are these fake, and therefore should be thrown away?

MAGK944

Nope, flip the whole axle shaft not just the cv joints. You can leave the cv joints in place, there’s no need to remove them from the shafts.

Breakaway944

Thanks for the clarification. I just watched a video that explains the joints have to be put together and installed on the axle in a very specific way. As you mentioned though, the whole axle assembly can be flipped.

MAGK944

Correct, if you do remove the cv joints you should put them back in the same position, it’s just best practice to “clock” them a certain way to improve their performance and life. If you don’t remove the cv joints from the axle you can simply flip the whole axle and you’re done. Flipping them causes the forces to now act on a new, unworn part of the cv joints and you’ve just doubled the life of your axles.