Have an 8 3/4 rear with '489 case and 3:55 gears in a 70 Challenger 440. Have had three different people rebuild it with new gears each time, yet it still makes noise. Believe the Green-type bearings are OK. Not sure I want to tackle this myself, although it seems I can't do any worse. Who are the best out there to rebuild this rear? I have no options locally.

It may just be that the pinion wasn't tightened enough or maybe it was tightened too much, if so you will need a new crush sleeve or a crush sleeve eliminator. I'm not 100% sure I'm right, it is just an idea.

Wow. I've built lots of rear ends and never had a complaint. Surely one of the three had the correct tools and smarts to get it right. Is the noise unbearable? What ratios? Were they all the same car? You might try doctor diff on the board here. He does lots of gears.

would another ready to go pig be an option? definitely the gears & not ujoints/ujoint angle/front yoke issue (bad ext housing bearing)/trans mount? noise on accell or decell or all the time?

Is it possible that the housing could be warped enough to cause the axles to distort the gear pattern? three times from three different people with three sets of gears.... My money says Its not them, dude. There's something in your geometry that is causing issues.

You BELIEVE they are ok ???

But ARE they ok ???

I can't see the axles distorting anything enough to cause the issue unless the axles required a 10lb sledge hammer to install them ...

You do have some local options. A very good friend of mine in Florence specializes in rebuilding rearends. He setup the last 489 8.75 I used. It worked perfect and was quiet. I've built a couple myself and had good luck w/ them, I just don't like doing it.
I'm in Marion, not too far from you.

I will say this much. I had a friend buy a rebuilt 489 case unit from ebay with new gears, bearings, and new suregrip unit. It was noisy as soon as it was installed, but after setting in his house for a couple years while car was being restored. He removed it immediately and had another shop look at it and they told him to go with factory 3.55 gears and not the new gears set, so he bought some factory gears and had them put in the case with the new bearings and suregrip. Again it was noisy, so he removed it and shelved it. After a while I took time to check it out for him and found that the suregrip unit would move inside the bearing caps when they were torqued down. So Then I noticed the caps on the case had been changed out and were not even the caps for a 489 case much less that particular case, so I put all his parts over into another 489 case with the original caps and it has been good to go ever since.
Matt