Posted by David Sherman on Monday, November 28, 2005 at 0:30AM :
In Reply to: Need advise on ring gear posted by MarkP on Saturday, November 26, 2005 at 12:19PM :
I'll go with the consensus: run it, but check the bearings first. It got pitted like that because it was either in the bottom part of the housing in water or in the top part and it sat a long time and all the oil ran off it and the moist air rusted it. Either way, it's hard to say whether the same moisture got into the bearings or not, but in general rust pits on bearings grow bigger and bigger until the rollers shatter, whereas rust pits on gears just cause a bit of noise. Besides, bearings are cheaper to replace.
Or, my other philosophy when I'm not sure whether or not to replace something is to figure that if it's already maybe starting to go bad, the worst that will happen if I keep running it is it really will totally wear out eventually, and then I'll need to replace it. If it's the same amount of work to replace it later as to do it now, why not just wait and see? It might end up lasting a long time.