Tried swapping in my second CAS today... I didn't have much faith that it'd work due to grittiness of the movement of the sensor on the bench, but I was curious if the noise would change at all, and for the most part it was exactly the same. Silent for about 10 minutes, and then once everything was nice and warmed up it would make noise at about 1000rpm or so. The noise gets louder and quieter while playing with the CAS timing adjustment and I am definitely feeling the vibration through the cap when the noise was happening. Maybe I just have two bum sensors?
These days I've got a bit more time than money, and I had a buddy mention that he can get damn near any bearing you can think of through the machine shop he works at. Has anyone successfully rebuilt a CAS or is it more trouble than its worth? I have seen the RB20 CAS teardown thread, lots of good pics there but he wasn't worried about his bearings...
Anyway, here are a couple more pictures of what I'm looking at. Nothing jumped out at me, but maybe more experienced eyes may see something I'm missing.
Overview under the valve cover
gear mesh seems to be clean without much wear on either side
looking through the CAS mounting hole to where the shaft sits... I initially thought the noise could be coming from here, but there doesn't seem to be enough wear.
Ideas? What seems to be the best source for a new or remanufactured CAS?