Popping-grinding noise ARRGH!

[Willard]

This is starting to drive me nuts! I have a popping-grinding sound coming from front the passenger side area. Happens when accelerating, stopping, and during slow speed maneuvers. If I goose the accelerator it will happen as well. It does NOT occur when moving at any speed.
I've had the LCAs, UCAs, shocks all verified they are tight and in place. I've check the motor mounts, bakes body mounts, and u-joints; they all look in good order. Anything else I should look at??

[4point]

A unit bearing maybe? (hub bearing)

[Willard]

I found this thread right after posting mine which exactly describes my issues, I've sent a PM, we'll see what he says.

[cweed]

My son's jeep had this same problem and we found the top three bolts on the transfer case transmission bolts loose. When he stepped on the gas the transfer case would push back just enough so that the gearing was only catching on 1/4" of the gear resulting in the popping noise. We simply tighten up the botls and everything was fine after that.

[Willard]

Was the noise in your son's Jeep coming from the passenger side front tire area? My wife said she felt the footwell move a bit when this happens. Its aggrivating because when you examine the area everything looks fine.

[cweed]

Yes it was and he could also feel something thumping underneath on the passenager side. But whe you stopped there was nothing to be seen. We when around and tightened all of the transfer case mounting bolts and that cured it. The loose bolts at the top was just enougn to put everything out of alignment on the gearing when in gear amd moving.

[cweed]

The noise we heard and felt was as if the universal joint was bad, but when we shook on the shaft there was no play. By hand we didn't have the force needed to duplicate the problem. The drive train did.

He has not had a problem since then.