Gearbox change box or oil

Hi all,
110 300tdi pick up has been making metallic clinking noise when under load. So thought I’d change oil in diffs, transfer box and gearbox.
When draining gearbox oil there was a lot of fine swarf on drain plug and the oil was very grey not red ( have changed oil 10,000 mls ago ).
Assumed gearbox was about to fail so have started removing.
Found the rear prop universal joint is quite notchy in one direction and am thinking this may have been cause of noise.
Any thoughts on next step? Thanks in advance for your time.

Bang some fresh oil in the box, stick on a new prop and change the oil again in a month or two and see how its going.

Thanks for getting back to me. Did you see the photo of gearbox drain plug?

imc said:

Thanks for getting back to me. Did you see the photo of gearbox drain plug?

Click to expand...

Yes they generally always have swarf on them, lt77 is much the same.
I would just use some cheap atf, no point using good oil for a test, then if its seems okay stick some of the diff lock syn gearbox oil in it.

+1
Lynall's advice is exactly how I'd proceed, and that looks a normal amount of swarf on a drain plug to me too. Doesn't look chunky which is where I'd start to worry