GE washer

The washer makes an intermittent metallic grinding noise during agitation.
It is very pronounced when the front panel is taken off the machine.
The bottom panel is not hitting the pulleys and there seems to be plenty of clearance.

The noise seems to be coming from the center of the agitator towards the bottom, from neat the transmission.

Seems to be more pronounced during heavy loads.

No other noises, even at high speed spin.

Any advice? Thank you

It could be the agitator hub but more likely is a problem with the transmission. See if you can determine if the sound is coming from the transmission housing, in which case replacement of the machine is probably the best bet.