Cracked flex plate??

[euroshark]

I just picked up a clean '87 325e automagic with about 180k miles on it. Things were fine for the first couple of days but now I have a fairly loud scraping or chirping noise coming from the flex plate / torque converter area. It's almost like a noisy belt at first but then it changes into more metallic sound that matches engine speed. It seems to go away for a second when you shift into drive or reverse, but comes back pretty quickly... It almost disappears at a steady cruise but comes back once you start accelerating.

I pulled the inspection cover off and checked all of the bolts that hold the converter onto the flex plate... they are all very tight.

Is this a common issue? I've never experienced this with my turbo Volvos or any other car for that matter.

[gearheadE30]

Sometimes the auto trans's get noisy oil pumps, is my understanding. I don't really think there are any typical conditions under which the flex plate would break. Sometimes it's just grit in the transmission fluid that makes it make noise, so you might want to try a new filter/fluid.