Attempting not to start off with a big block of text, I need some help with this one. The shop can't figure out what is causing this.

click to play...

 

now the details.
The issue is the noise. there are no drivability symptoms, the car seems to be running great.
the sound is a clanking sound. there are very specific times when this happens.
it occurs while the clutch is engaging, so while the clutch pedal is being released. typically when you start off in first that point where you hold the clutch allowing it to slip as the car starts moving, that's right when it happens.
if i am very easy on the car it does not happen, not quieter, nothing at all. if I start off a little faster, or going up hill, or even start off into a tight turn it is much more common. it seems to happen only when there is more load on the drive train. but it doesn't take much even while driving casually it happens several times a week.
no noise at all when the clutch is fully in or fully out. actually once i have the clutch fully engaged I can give it throttle and there are no problems.

history: this started right after i had the clutch replaced. replaced the stock clutch with a Monster Stage 2 (guys at monster have been awesome in helping me...but they have no clue what it could be) the sound was there immediately after the replacement. its been about a year ~3000-4000 miles or so. I can only assume the shop did not put something back together correctly. I took it back to them and they worked on it for a while, didn't take the drivetrain/clutch out, but wanted to blame the shifter itself for making the noise. we swapped the shifter box since it was a little loose, but that did nothing.

I listened with a stethoscope to the sound and could hear it mostly on the screw that attaches the shifter to the shift rod and on the bolts that attach the shifter to the torque tube. I think its coming from either the clutch or inside the torque tube, but I'm clueless as to what it may be.
I also looked at the shift rod near the shifter and with a mirror all the way into the back of the torque tube while hearing the noise, did not see any unusual vibration, movement or anything. Nothing seems to be contacting the rod.

 

also, when the clutch was replaced I also had the torque tube bushings and the bearings replaced. so all of this was apart. the diff was replaced also, but I don't think that is related.

 

It has to be a clutch issue if it doesn't do it once the clutch is fully engaged. It's only doing it while there is slippage between the clutch, pressure plate and flywheel. Maybe a spring in the pressure plate is broken ?

 

Seems clutch related but that aside, I've seen a guy who had a similar issue and it turned out to be a bad pilot bearing as a result of damage from an alignment issue when reinstalling the torque tube.

Stop driving it and pull it apart and figure out what the problem is before it possibly chews up your crank.