Right, I was driving earlier andtarted hearing a sort of whirring/scraping noise when taking my foot off the gas or putting the clutch down. I took it to the garage, who took it took out for a test drive and told me a differential bearing has gone, which he says will lead to the gearbox going. They said I neecd a new gearbox and gave me a quote of £1000 fitted!! Now I'm not gonna pay that! lol. What I want to know is this. Can this bearing be replaced so I don't have to replace the entire gearbox, and if possible, how hard is it/how much would it cost? Cheers, Chris

Oh yeh, my Polo is a 1999 Mk4 1.4 CL

i just had my diff end layshaft bearing and my diff bearings replaced {diff x2 15£ layshaft 11£}

i removed the box and got a mate in the kno to fit them {20£}

i aint saying it's gona be this cheap but it is the way forward if you can do it this way.

i previousley had had quotes to recon at 2 gearbox specilists at around 395+vat to recon +150 to remove and refit and a gearbox from a breakers at 200£ which i returned when it was the wrong one and my mate offerd a hand.

any way you do it it's gona be cheaper than 1000£

allso i have seen internals of a gearbox that had a bearing fail and the rollers from the bearing made hell of a mess of all the gear cogs if this happens to your box it will probably not be repairable so i wouldnt drive it too far before you get it fixed or get another ready to go in when it does go pop

hope this helps

oh yeah looked at it apart and i wouldnt suggest you try to replace yourself unless you are really mechanicly minded!!!