Couple days ago my budd asked me to race his VR6, he wanted to see how bad he gets beat. We lined up and it had rained earlier so the roads were wet. I feathered the first gear and dropped into second and floored it, the rear tires (19inch with 275s, 555 extreme) started to hop big time and all of the sudden I heard this load popping sound .. It was like something snapped in the back of the car.
Does anybody know what that could be? I thought my rims were coming apart but (i have j8s -- no hiros here) I checked them later and they fine, I stuck my head underneath of the Z and didn't see anything wrong. Any ideas? the car drives just fine.

 

ok so im going to go ahead and put my flame suit on before i post... im gonna take a stab at it now. If it was cold out it could be your suspention creaking, seeing how the wheels were hopping it would make sense. that happened in my 240Z when it was 37 degrees out. but im somewhat of a newb for mechanics..

 

The car drives just fine though ... i am not sure if that's what it is

 

I would think with the hop that you could wreck the gears in the diff. Maybe knock some teeth off it...but if you said it drives fine...I'm puzzled.

 

im just thinking it could of been from the temperature change that the metal could still be growing/shrinking(if it was cold or hott that day) nothing would be wrong with the car later...

 

When the pop happened, was there a noticeable change in the behavior of the car (not afterward, I mean when it happened). Do you have an LSD? If so, they can make a loud popping sound if the rear tires are turning at uneven speeds.

 

I have enth model .. and traction was off .... also it was like maybe 45 degrees out .... the car drives fine .. i actually did couple of burn outs to see if anything's wrong with the car .. but nothing was wrong
I thought i lost one of the lead patches on the wheel and it banged into the car .. but no that wasnt it either ...

 

If it drives fine then I dont see why theres anything to worry about...If something snapped youd know.

 

Very good point! i was thinkin about the same thing..did you have ur VCD on or ur TcS? whatever model you have... if you didnt have ur LSD on "LOCKED" uneven speed might make u slip and metal hittin metal was ur sound there.

 

hmm, interesting same thing happened to me. I dumped it for a burn out and then a stretch run but instead I got wheel hop and a loud popping/crackikng noise despite feathering the clutch too. I did burn outs and romped her to see if it came back or drove different, but it drives fine. Made that sound twice though now.

 

If you broke the drive shaft or rear axle you would know it.

 

depending on the pitch of the sound, you may have bottomed the bushings holding the rearend to the chassis. that would be more of a thud though and not high pitched like metal hitting sharply.
could be the axle clicking prob, just alot louder under that certain condition. i read the nissan fix for that, they pull the axle bolt and put grease on it, lol. good to go.

 

i am glad someone else experienced this .... yeah it was kind of weird and somewhat scary i must say

 

most extreeme...

 

^^ Ouch!!!

 

Dude, turn off the hydraulics next time you drag. Bouncing your car when beating someone is just throwing pie in their face. That's uncool and goes against the unspoken rules of road etiquette.

 

You Very Well could have run over an object on the road, perhaps a stone or somethng metal. That would definatly create a POP, Possibly cause some Wheel Hop and otherwise not cause any further problems.

 

it's def not that ...

 

Early in the 350Zs life, there was a popping noise in almost all Zs under acceleration. Some kind of axle bolts needed tightening. Mine had the problem, it sounded just like a U-joint pinging under stress. The dealership tightened the crap out of them and the problem went bye bye.

 

that wasn't it. I felt the pop in the in the steering wheel ...I know what you are talking about .... it was loud ... extremely loud .. like i said erlier it felt like something snapped