Thread: I need help with my jeep...its making noises it's not supposed to.?

I have a 04 TJ, lift, bigger tires, lower gears, all that jazz. It has about 65,000 miles or so and I change the oil and all that regularly. It's my daily driver.
After putting roughly 400 hard miles on it last week however, I noticed a low, deep base type sound coming from what I assume is the tranny. It was so low that I was the only one that could hear it clearly. It also seemed to lose a bit of horsepower going uphill, although that did not show on the rpm's. It was almost like I was pushing it too hard, but it was the same road I had driven many times before. I could be imagining that, but I don't think so.
Then a few days later, the helicopter noise started. It only does it while I am accelerating, and in gear. I haven't tested reverse yet.
The thing is I know that most auto shops will try to take me for all I've got.
I'm thinking it could be transmission, or exhaust manifold. Does anyone else have any ideas? Anything I should tell the mechanics so they will know I am not a complete idiot, or that I know what direction they should be looking towards?

what do you mean by run hard. it could be a number of things. if you are sure its coming from the tranny could be the converter. once the converter is locking up it vibrates. check reverse it prolly wont do it cause you wont go fast enough in reverse to get it to lock up. if it does its prolly not the converter. best bet is to have it professionally checked. if you think they are going to rip you off get a second opinion, another shop to look at it and see what they say...good luck

it might be your drive shaft. did you have them customized when you had the lift done?