Roamerdrive newly installed, loud metallic whine?

[CRiordan01]

Hi,

Earlier this week, I installed a new Roamerdrive on my Series III. Installation was pretty straight forward, but I have noticed now that anytime I take my foot off of the accelerator while in gear, whether the overdrive is engaged or not, I have a very loud metallic whine that seems to be coming from the gear box. This whine is much louder than the vehicle ever was without the unit. If I press the accelerator even slightly, the whine goes away. Is this normal? In one of the threads someone indicated that they had a howl for the first few hundred miles while the new and old gears wear together...is this what I am hearing? I have only put 30 or so miles on the unit since install, but I am a little nervous to run it right now for fear of damage.

The unit is working with noticeablly lower rpm in the 45+ mph range. It's just when I lay off the accelerator that the whine / howl kicks in...

Advice please!

[slowmo]

No idea on the howl, but have you noticed an improvement in driving up hills? I have to get out and push my 70 IIa 88" when going up hills.

[CRiordan01]

Freeway driving with the Roamerdrive is more pleasant (so to speak), but I haven't tackled any major hills yet.

[lumpydog]

Slowmo - I have an overdrive and don't use it on hills… If anything, I take it out of overdrive when I get to a hill.

Sounds like you might have a different problem. Loss of power like that leads me to wonder if your timing is too retarded or maybe the carb adjustment is not quite there? On my Rover (when it was new to me) the timing mark was at TDC and I was getting a lot of carbon/soot in the exhaust water. The power was anemic on hills. The ignition timing was way off. I advanced the timing 6-7 degrees and it made a huge difference.

Charlie

[slowmo]

Thanks! I'll double check it.

And now we return you to the topic at hand...

[chilidavid]

Don't know if the following makes you feel any better, but:

I just installed a new Roamerdrive a few months ago, and I was surprised at how little noise the unit made from the beginning. Before test-driving my '71 S2a, I filled the unit with Redline MTL manual transmission fluid, and have yet to hear a peep out of the unit. Now, it does generate a very light whine (even when un-engaged), but the sound is very slight, and now I'm not sure whether it can be heard with or without my foot on the accelerator...? Not sure. When the unit is engaged though (almost daily), I can hear no difference in volume of the extremely faint whine. But - I'm also running those Michelin 750 x 16 knobby military tires (also sold by our host), so the tires sing quite loudly when I'm driving down the road. Those particular Michelins are loud!

BOTTOM LINE: I'm convinced the unit should NOT make any loud metallic whines - even when newly installed. I'm also sure that Rex Young, the production manager for Roamerdrive, would be able to resolve any questions you might have about unexpected noises.

AGAIN: My new Roamerdrive is very quiet. I almost expected more noise, but just don't hear much from the unit at any speeds. I use it in second, third, and fourth - and more often in third when I have a bridge to climb here in Florida!

David

[TravelinLight]

I just installed a New SS model in my 109 6 pot. I saw your video on Facebook and mine does not make that noise. Still getting used to mine so I cannot discuss performance but I can say after 50 miles or so I do not have the whine.

[pitchrollyaw]

I have the Roamerdrive on my SIII. There is a slight gear whine, different tone on and off throttle, which I attribute to a new gear meshing w/ the existing set. I did have a much louder metallic sound on acceleration which turned out to be the linkage rattling. Snugged things up a bit and all seems fine.