Rear Differential Damper

skittlenips

Just out of curiosity, does anyone know how crucial part #9 is in the diagram below? It's some sort of harmonic/vibrational damper for the rear diff. I know that when the rubber goes bad on them, most people just take the part off and never bother to replace it. Anyone ever noticed a difference in vibration or noise when running a good one vs. none at all?

I just ordered a new one to be safe, but I'm kinda curious because I've talked to people that simply don't use one (there isn't one on the rt4wd that I bought either) and they don't really seem to have any issues. I figure it's mostly a noise reducer, and not really important to the operation of the diff, unlike #'s 10, 8, and 5.

Abide

pulled mine right out without even needing to cut the rubber when i did my sway bar, i havent noticed a bit of difference personally.

bam-bam

Earlier ones ('88s and maybe some early '89s ) didn't have them anyway. It's just there to dampen some kind of vibe that bugged an engineer at Honda. I'm using one on my '89, just because I had it and urethaned it with all the other mounts. I really doubt that I would notice the lack of it though.

skittlenips

Gotcha, well that's good to know. My order for one that I placed got cancelled because they're discontinued, hahaha. I talked to a buddy that recently bought one through Honda and he said that there's only a handful of them left in stock throughout the country (I dunno how exactly he found that out). So if ya really want one, better try and track it down soon!!!

NobiZero

I ripped mine out when I was replacing my gas tank. I get more vibrations from the driveshaft than from back in the diff.