Throw Out Bearing Replacement?
 

So my car just got that infamous 'whine' sound when the car is in idle.
I press on the clutch and the sound goes away. After reading numerous threads I'm afraid it might be the throw out bearing or something along those lines.

Anyone in the Phoenix metro area familiar with checking such parts? I'm new to the auto world so I wouldn't even know where to start and I really don't want to have to take it to the dealership.

I'm actually going to tackle swapping out my TOB tomorrow morning! I've never done it before, so yeah, that'll be interesting.

If DIY doesn't sound fun to you, I'd hit up our local club tuner/mechanic Dallen. https://www.facebook.com/dbtuned/. He actually just did a TOB change about a week ago. His contact information is on his page. He's replaced engines, installed turbo kits, plus all the normal maintenance stuff on these cars. I'd trust him with anything. I'll let him know someone might be hitting him up about a TOB change.

Let me know how the swap goes for you! I'm all for DIY but I don't think I have all the tools necessary for it.. also, I'd be afraid of messing something up.

I'll check out the contact you mentioned! I just don't wanna have to spend close to 1k for something like this!

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Updating you on the DIY. Holy. Shit. I understand why the average labor cost for this job is ~1k now. Took me and 1-3 friends, over a span of 2 days, 20 hours to change the bearing. Literally spent all weekend doing that. Celebrated with a Five Guys burger at 10pm Sunday night, haha!

Granted this is the first time I've removed the transmission from this car, so someone with more experience could probably get the job done much faster. Dallin says he can do it in ~3.5 hours, but he's done the job multiple times, and has all the proper tooling to get something like that done fairly quickly.

Because there's so many parts that need to be removed, I can understand your concern about not wanting to mess something up. After we had everything removed, and we were laying under the car trying to wiggle the transmission off, I was scared shitless that I was either going to 1) be crushed by the transmission and die under the car, or 2) never have the car run the same way again.

In terms of how hard the actual job was, I'd give it a 6 out of 10. Nothing was incredibly difficult. Everything up to the point of removing the transmission was actually pretty easy, we were just taking out time. The bolts that hold the starter on are a pain to reach, but that was about it. Once the transmission's out, the hardest thing is putting it back in. Then just put back everything that was taken off. There's just a lot to take off.

After dropping the car and starting it, clutch pedal was butter smooth. I even had a hard time figuring out where the clutch made contact, because it was just so damn smooth. The only problem, which I ran into today, was not adjusting the reverse lockout plate correctly, and I wasn't able to use first gear on the way home from work. :p I just removed the center console again, adjusted it properly, and now its fine. Took about 30 minutes.

So there's you go. A novel. If you're the kind of person that doesn't let other people work on your car, you feel you have the tools and bodies to help, and your patient enough to take your time to ensure quality care is taken, I'd definitely recommend doing it yourself. If you don't have the right tools, but still want to wrench on the car, I'd hit up Dallin, and just let him know you're willing to help because you want to learn. If you don't want anything to do with it, I'd still hit up Dallin, haha. He'll charge you, but it won't be nearly as much as a dealership.

If you hit him up, let him know Kyle (@bwaaap86) sent you. :)

The transmission in this car is just about the easiest to remove ever and it requires little more than a jack, jack stands, basic wrenches and sockets, a gear oil pump and a pan to drain oil in to. Unless you have a stubborn exhaust stud on the over pipe it's really not hard. Also, there's no real "checking" the TOB. You have symptoms of the TOB being bad. If you drop the transmission, definitely replace the TOB. "Checking" it is not an option after you've gone through that much trouble.

This is interesting. I just posted a thread yesterday on an issue I was having with a similar sound. After swapping my clutch and TOB, I started getting a squeaking noise with the clutch pedal fully out (clutch engaged). This actually had nothing to do with the TOB since it is not touching the clutch, and everything to do with the clutch fork itself. Take a look at the thread below and see if it sounds similar. Even if it doesn't fix your issue, it's a $5 and maybe 20 minutes.

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=130326

Totally agree. By far the easiest I've done. I like how the bottom two studs are very long making it really easy to get on and off without having to worry about it becoming unstable and rolling off the jack. The bolts are all very easy to reach too, even with a bulky air ratchet. The hardest part of the job is getting the rubber boot off the shift linkage. Next time I'm in there that boot is getting cut off and thrown in the trash.

Did you support the front of the engine? I have not done the work myself but everything I have read by those that have said it is much easier if the engine is supported. When you undo the tranny the engine droops a bit which makes it hard to line things up.

Did you jack the front of the engine to prevent it from tipping forward? If you don't do that, or do it too little or too much the lower studs on the tranny will bind up making it very hard to slide the tranny off/on. If you get the angle just right it takes very minimal effort. I'm not sure if you did just the TOB or also the clutch but when you do the clutch it's very important that you put a lot of effort into aligning the disk perfectly otherwise it will be nearly impossible to put the tranny back on.

Edit: I typed this message hours ago but didn't post it until now but I see Tcoat beat me to it. :)

Well at least any future reader will get the idea of how important it is to support the engine!

It's a must. I struggled and had to force the transmission out because I didn't support the engine... I support the engine when putting the tranny back in and it was so easy. Having a tranny jack really helps.

We did! After we removed the shift bushing on the second day, the transmission pretty much slid out on it's own. Being in Arizona and in a garage with no AC, we were taking frequent breaks. We also really just didn't want to rush anything. If we were to do it again, we could probably get it down to 5 hours.

I went to Harbor Freight and bought a tranny jack the second day. My confidence in dropping the transmission without crushing my face greatly increased after using it.

I cut a 1x6 just the right length to put between my floor jack and the tranny and it was surprisingly stable. It’s nice that this tranny has that nice flat area right where it balances perfectly. I still wouldn’t place my body directly under it though. 86lbs dropping 1ft would probably do some damage. Hahaha