Gear whine is not normal...never

gear whine means that the gears are setup wrong or there is something about to break. I have never owned a Ford that had gear whine.

$15,000 for a 04 with 98k miles is excessive to me. You can buy a brand new XLT for ~$25k.

I'd steer clear. The 04's and early 05's also tended to have a few issues as well. You may get lucky, but Murphy's law says you won't. A late year 05 and newer would be optimum

 

Exactly, that's why Ford made a pinion repair kit to fix these whining rear ends. In the beginning (04'-05' Models) Ford was replacing the whole differential, but since so many were being replaced, they came out with a kit to replace just the gears making the noise.

Either way, I had two whining Ford trucks, now they are as quiet as any car.

 

Dood where in hell can you buy a new f-150 for 25k screw that is, I didnt think so, I am a uaw worker I know the $`s & the 04 still blue book for $18000 to $23000 with that many miles. This truck is a lariat loaded. When you guys say the gears are set up wrong this is the way they are coming from the factory.

 

I bought a 2004 F150 Lariat 4x4 that MSRP'd at $38,XXX and got it for $27,XXX at the end of the year.

 

I bought my FX4 SCrew with the Luxury package Oct 2006 after the 2007's hit lots. MSRP was $42k...I paid $32k after tax/title/liscence.

So yes, a nice XLT can be bought new for ~$25k. And just because a vehicle blue books up high, doesn't mean jack. There are lots of factors to pricing. But realistically, do you want to pay $18k for a vehicle that may/may not last another 50k miles? Besides, most banks refer to Edmunds and NADA when it comes to evaluating a vehicle price. KBB tends to over-estimate vehicle worth by $1-2,000

the rear-end issue was due to a design problem. Ford has since pretty much fixed the issue. it just took about 1 1/2 years to catch and correct

 

Does this mean if I get new ring/Pinnon as I will this week to stop my whine, I'll be a diff design that shouldn't do it again... Or is it just that I have 140,000 miles...

 

It should be fine.

 

should be fine unless your shafts are damaged also.

 

My 04 FX4 Screw had 77K when I bought it and the rear diff had a loud whine. I rolled the dice since it was a decent deal (18K) and spent a grand getting it fixed by my local Ford stealership. Guess what? 18 months and 20K miles later, the whine is back which is why I checked this forum. I plan on taking it back even though the 1 year parts and warranty has expired on this repair. If I could go back and do it all over again, I wouldn't buy this truck.

 

A lot of the replacement gearsets are junk too, they came from the same vendor that the originals did. Some trickery and clever set up - stuff that isn't really mentioned in the service manual - can help in preventing the whine from coming back.

 

Dealership called to let me know the fix is now $1,400 but since it is the second go around, it will only cost $940 (original fix was $1000) since it is out of the 12 month/12K mile warranty. Called Ford Customer Relations which were no help. I love the truck but may have to sell after this episode as I don't want to spend 1K/year on a reoccurring problem. Anyone have any alternative suggestions?

 

JUNKYARD

an axle is very easy to swap out. besides, if you have a 4x2 with 3.55 gears, you might get lucky and grab a set of 3.73 gears

I have never paid more than $300-400 for a used axle.

If the axle has been fixed once, I'm thinking your axle shafts are now screwed also. Once 1 part in there goes, everything else goes as well.