Hey, so I'm pretty new to the forum. Actually posting for my roommate. Used to have a Fiero, got on pennock's fiero forum for all my maintenance questions, so I thought this would be a good place to start for questions with a badass 1981 datsun.

He was driving home earlier today. Went to flip a U-turn, burned the tires flipping around, lost power to the rear wheels and it rolled to a stop. He found silver colored fluid leaking and a metal piece that had broken off the casing where the drivetrain connects to the axle.

It had been making a light clicking noise that was the ball joints. Then about a week ago it also started making a deeper, much louder clunking noise that would cause a small skip in the car with each clunk. It would make the noise for a bit, then it would stop, then it would start back up again for no apparent reason.

Rust aside, the rest of the car is in pretty awesome condition and he'd rather fix it than sell it. Would he need a whole new axle? What's the best/ most cost effective way to go here?

 

get a whole diff and axles. shouldn't be expensive if you find one locally.

 

Silver colored fluid? As far as I know the only silver colored fluid is gear oil with a ton of metal shavings in it.

Uh, from what I gather you snapped something at the nose of the driveshaft. More then likely the u-joint by the sound of it. Not to bad a fix depending on the damage. Posting pics of it can help us figure it out too!

PS: Welcome to Zdriver!