Trying to track it down for awhile, hoping for suggestions.

Rear end of my car has always been noisy, i bought it last summer and have put 20k miles on it. Much, if not all of that tine, this noise has been preset. I'm certain its coming from the back of the car, from the inside it kind of sounds like I'm in a truck with mud tires driving on asphalt. There is no vibration associated with this, just noise.

I got the right combo of extensions and adapters to fit the rear diff fluid cap, but it won't budge yet, soaked in penetrating oil and will try again, dunno whats in there, how old it is or how much, so ill be sucking it out and putting some fresh 75w-140 in there maybe this weekend.

Lubed all 4 u-joints awhile ago, they all took several pumps of grease before they started to make that air escaping noise, so I'll assume they were probably dry or close to it. i have some play in the left outer u-joint, so it feels like its probably time for all 4 to be done so i dont end up doing one and then have another go on me.

Only thing i can think of apart from those items are wheel bearings. I have no play in the wheel at all, so I'm leaning away from this, but am open to diagnostic suggestions.

Any ideas? Thanks!

 

output bearings

live with it

 

I had a loud bearing noise that ended up being the driveshaft center support bearing in my old 98’ XJR. I didn’t experience any vibration though. The noise went away after I installed a good used driveshaft we had from one of the parts cars at the time. Still running and driving just fine at 279k miles.

 

I had no noise but very strange vibrations in tight turns. It was rusty and sloppy u-joint.