ACTUALLY, I never said temperature had any factor in the noise at all. The way temperature got into all of this was because some people thought it might have been the engine turning on, so I clarified that it is always there regardless of operating temperature. I do own the vehicle and am trying to find out if a certain amount of drive line lash is to be expected or an indicator of a future problem that I should be on top of before it escalates.

One of the desireable effects of having a torque converter is that it would serve to "smooth" the non-linear torque output of the pistons as they s-l--o---w----l-----y travel those first few POWER strokes upon inital ICE starting. Since the FEH does not use a torque converter there is no "masking" of those non-linear torque effects.

Once the ICE is started and fully up to speed that non-linearity is not so obvious.

Well, it's just as noticeable when it's warm as when it's cold though.