Got in the '82 242 DL yesterday. Started it up. No problem. Now, I have noticed for the last six months that the transmission makes a 'whirring' noise when the clutch is engaged (pedal up) and transmission in neutral. Push the pedal to the floor and the noise is gone. I also have some gear whine in 1st and 2nd, mostly when decelerating. I attribute that to the fact that the car is 36 years old and has 380K on the original engine and M46 transmission. Clutch is about three years old. Maybe 25K miles, if that.

So, I let the clutch out and start to accelerate in 1st. What the heck is that?! A horrible and LOUD noise coming from the transmission. Sounds like I took about a dozen marbles, put them in an empty coffee can, and then shook the heck out of the can. It stopped when I shifted into 2nd. Okay. Drive a few blocks to the next stop light. This time, the noise persisted through 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears.

Now, the weird thing is that it doesn't do it every time. Sometimes, I can "launch" the car with no strange noises. I'd say about every third time that I accelerate from a stop, I get the "marbles in a coffee can" noise. It sounds really nasty though!

Any ideas? I am guessing a bearing got chewed up and the pieces are getting kicked around. But which bearing? Strangely, the car drives and shifts normally.