[Rembrant]

Hi folks,

I finally pulled my transmission last night (S10 5spd) on Flathead bell housings. There had been a scraping noise when the clutch was pushed in, but it would go away and be smooth and quiet with the clutch out while driving. I thought it was the throw out bearing and I have one on order, but yesterday the sound got a little worse and was present not only with the clutch pressed, but also with the clutch out, however a bit less noisy. So I drove the truck home and jacked it up and pulled the trans. The ends of the three pressure plate fingers were worn down quite badly and looked like they had been hitting the front edge of the throw out bearing (the not rotating part) and thus making a scraping sound.

However, things got worse when I pulled the main bell housing and pressure plate, etc. You can see where the flywheel has been wearing into the dust shield that the starter is mounted to. That sounds like pretty bad news to me…here I thought I was going to be changing a throw out bearing or at the worst a clutch and pressure plate, but by the looks of this the clutch action is pushing the crank forward and making the flywheel contact the dust shield.

Is that a bad thrust bearing, or a bad crank, or both?
The engine starts and runs great. No smoke, no other issues to speak of.
Darn it.

Thoughts or comments good or bad?