Dolomite 1500 rear axle

[GIX 7]

Hi
A technical question.
Is the Dolomite/Marina rear axle pinion a collapsible spacer type arrangement?
I have a noise from mine which appears on light throttle cruising and goes away when accelerating. I have read it may be that the pinion bearings are not pre loaded and can be fixed by tightening the nut. Is this so?
All feedback welcome.
Thanks

[Macleesh]

It's a conditional answer, yes they used collapsible spacers, but not from the beginning of production. As far as I know the spacers are unavailable now so a rebuild would need to be undertaken with conventional shims as used on earlier cars. You can get away without disturbing a collapsible spacer when replacing the pinion oil seal if you are careful to mark the nut before removal but nipping up a noisy one will I fear just bring final failure closure.

[cliftyhanger]

Hi
A technical question.
Is the Dolomite/Marina rear axle pinion a collapsible spacer type arrangement?
I have a noise from mine which appears on light throttle cruising and goes away when accelerating. I have read it may be that the pinion bearings are not pre loaded and can be fixed by tightening the nut. Is this so?
All feedback welcome.
Thanks

I believe the 3.89 diffs are solid spacer, the later 3.63 collapsable. (solid use a castellated nut and split pin, collapsable a nyloc with a metal cover)
However, the whine is most likely from CWP wear, and moving the pinion may well make things rather worse. It would have been set up in the best position from the factory. You can check for CWP backlash, very subtle and not the usual turn teh pinion. It will be a tiny tiny amount, 1-2mm rotation.

[GIX 7]

Thanks for that info. Will check mine in due course.