Looking at the fuser from the back of the printer. There is a spring on the lower left side of the fuser. It maybe putting too much pressure on the shaft above it causing it to fail.
Install a new fuser. If the noise comes back, loosen the upper right fuser mounting screw just a little bit. This seems to work. This may work on the original fuser if it's not too far gone.

Got this from another tech who works at a site with a load of 2430s and 40s