[woodman]

Hello.

My rear axle has been getting gradually noisier for some time now, and then after a motorway run at the weekend there was a hot, oily smell. It was stronger around the o/s wheel, but it was there on n/s too. It was dark when we got home, so I had a grovel around in daylight yesterday.

I can't see any obvious oil leaks. There's no waggle in the road wheels with them off the road, no free play at all in fact. There's a bit of rotational play in the prop, but no nasty clonks, and I couldn't get any obvious sideways play in the diff nose. But it does make a hell of a noise - I'd say about 60 or 70% of all the noise the car makes at speed when not under heavy throttle is coming from the rear end.

From memory I changed the diff oil about 3,000 or 4,000 miles ago, but that hasn't had any impact on the fact that it's generally getting noiser.

I need to get it on a lift to be able to explore properly, but any thoughts on likely culprits would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Andy.