Anyone ever break a flexplate?? ITS RUNNING!

[Cwatts]

Well I fired up the mustang this weekend and pulled it out of the garage to finish up the welding on a guys firebird im working on. When I was done I fired up the mustang again and heard some AWFULL sounds coming from the motor. I immediately shut it down. My heart sank...sounded like some beating on my bellhousing with a sledge hammer. I started it back up and pulled in the garage. Got looking around and it is definitely coming from the front of the trans/bellhousing area. At idle it sounds horrible. Its a tinging clunking sound. If you touch the gas and rpms up to 1000-1100. Quiet as can be. So im pretty sure I broke my flexplate. I had an old F150 do the same thing, but when I took the trans out the flex plate was in 2 pieces. Im going to try to pull the trans tomorrow night and see what going on in there. Kinda sucks, that flexplate only has a few thousand miles on it. But if that's all that's wrong Will be happy with that!! Taking it down to my buddies garage to get it on the lift so I don't have to pull the trans laying on my back. Just hoping its nothing in the torque converter or pump.

Anyone else ever bust one up?? I will let you guys know what I find when I pull the trans.

Maybe you'll get lucky and its just a loose tconverter bolt! Good Luck

 

[turtle5353]

I got the tranny installed yesterday and all is well. Pretty simple job on the lift. Installed the new flexplate and the repaired torque converter. Topped off all the fluids and took her for a cruise. All was good. No more sounds and shes running great. Im glad it was something simple. Back on the road for under $100 and couple hours in garage. I loctited the **** out of the flexplate bolts and torque converter nuts. Hope that never happens again. Any how im happy to be back on the road and enjoying the summer!! heres a pic on the lift.

 

[jbojo]

Good to hear it was a simple fix and you are back on the road.

 

[Bentworker]

What are those two round tubes / rods that are looped under the lower control arm/ engine cross member?

 

[turtle5353]

What are those two round tubes / rods that are looped under the lower control arm/ engine cross member?

Those tubes are some good old fashioned redneck engineering. Years ago whoever had my car before me was watching a little too much Dukes of Hazzard and thought they could be like Bo and Luke. My crossmember under the motor was bent and pushed up pretty bad from what looks to be a bad Duke boys jump. I never really payed any attention to it until I myself was doing some spirited driving a few years ago and bottomed the front suspension out. I got out and took a look and I had oil pouring out of my motor. Seems the crossmember was no longer the lowest thing on the front of the car..... my oil pan was. So I pulled the motor and put another oil pan on. And my quick fix for the crossmember was to weld a couple plates to the top and bend some 3/4" solid round stock in a U and weld underneath the crossmember. Now the U round stock is my hillbilly skid plate for the time being.....several years! When I plan on tearing my car down again for a full restoration, I will be completely removing and replacing the motor crossmember and front crossmember since both are damaged. But until then "it is what it is" Sorry for the long explanation....LOL

 

[Bentworker]

What are those two round tubes / rods that are looped under the lower control arm/ engine cross member?

Those tubes are some good old fashioned redneck engineering. Years ago whoever had my car before me was watching a little too much Dukes of Hazzard and thought they could be like Bo and Luke. My crossmember under the motor was bent and pushed up pretty bad from what looks to be a bad Duke boys jump. I never really payed any attention to it until I myself was doing some spirited driving a few years ago and bottomed the front suspension out. I got out and took a look and I had oil pouring out of my motor. Seems the crossmember was no longer the lowest thing on the front of the car..... my oil pan was. So I pulled the motor and put another oil pan on. And my quick fix for the crossmember was to weld a couple plates to the top and bend some 3/4" solid round stock in a U and weld underneath the crossmember. Now the U round stock is my hillbilly skid plate for the time being.....several years! When I plan on tearing my car down again for a full restoration, I will be completely removing and replacing the motor crossmember and front crossmember since both are damaged. But until then "it is what it is" Sorry for the long explanation....LOL

Good to know I am not the only one who had to perform cross member surgery.