Clutch on my Series 2a has finally given up the ghost and I need to get in there and replacethe plate and bearing. Previously I have done this whilst having the whole engine/gearbox out but I'd rather not do that so - can I do it this way?
Drop rear prop, take up floor and tunnel covers, support rear of engine and gearbox on trolley jacks, unbolt gearbox, slide it back on jack/drop it enough to get access to clutch plate. Replace plate and then refit the gearbox? My chief lazy bit is to try and not take out the seat box btw.
I have direct experience of doing similar on a SWB Series 3, so I imagine the same applies:
- Remove the flooring and gearbox tunnel; you can leave the seat bases in place
- Undo front & rear propshafts [you have chocked the wheels, haven't you?]
- Undo anything else attached to the gearbox [eg: handbrake actuator, clutch slave cylinder]
- Support the gearbox - I used some ratchet straps strung from my roof-rack through the open driver & passenger doors but I understand that a trolley jack from underneath also works.
- Jack up the gearbox slightly to allow you to insert a small bit of wood between the bottom of the engine side of the gearbox bell housing and the chassis cross member. This prevents the engine from dropping too much when you separate it from the gearbox.
- Undo the ring of nuts holding the gearbox bell housing to the engine.
- Pull the gearbox backwards around 6 inches
You should now have enough clearence to remove & replace the clutch. One of those clutch alignment tools [a glorified dowel or similar tubing] is very handy to ensure that the clutch drive plate is accurately aligned with the recess in the flywheel for the gearbox input shaft to pass into it when they are reunited. You may need to cycle the gearbox ever so slightly to get the splines on the input shaft to engage with the splines on the clutch drive plate - I used the starter motor to turn the engine over [the electric ignition disconnected for obvious reasons] to do this, but wiggling the rear propshaft output would have a similar effect.
The most time consuming part of the entire job is removing the floor panels to begin with as the nuts/bolts are invariably welded together with rust.
Looking good - 2pm, armed with spanners, sockets, jacks, wood blocks and wedges.
3pm - floor is off, all levers are disconnected,
4pm gearbox and engine unbolted, gearbox mounting bolts released, all ready to rock and roll......
5pm - I spot the deliberate mistake - I've got an overdrive fitted!!!!!!!
Guess what - it gives you about half an inch too little room to get the gearbox out - waaaahhhh! I'm left with either moving the engine forward (too much hard work) or pulling the overdrive off the gearbox first. It will involve a few pints of EP90 all over the place but seems to be the least effort (and time).
Bad part is that I have the bellhousing far enough back to see that it is full of oil sludge - looks mostly like gearbox oil so I guess I've got an oil seal gone in there somewhere :-(
Graeme
p.s. if the Gods are smiling I will be getting a new galvanised chassis sometime in the next 18 months and it WILL have a bolt on crossmember
You could always take the seat box out. Its the bolts in the corners at the ends (that go through the sill and just behind it) that will cause you grief. If youre planning a chassis swap in the future youre going to have to do them sometime anyhow...
Even if you take the mounting brackets totally off the gearbox will it not move back far enough and low enough to get at the clutch?. Ive only ever done a non overdriven clutch in-situ, but im putting in an overdrive ATM, so its interesting to know.
I think the crank seal on the back of the engine can cause oil to hang around in the bell housing too.
Make sure you do a test removal of the crossmember before you put it all in. My mate has a galvanised chassis with a removable x-member.. but they galvanised it with the x-member in place, and we had to remove it with an angle grinder.
I wanted to avoid taking the seatbox out as I have non LR seats fitted and getting them off the box is, well, grief!
With the overdrive fitted there is, literally, about half an inch too little room - if I had decent facilities then I would simply move the engine forward a tad but, I don,t so I cannot. It is snug against the crossmember behind the gearbox and removing the mounts would not help (removing the exhaust light allow enough lateral movement to slip it out but that's another kettle of fish I'd rather leave.
Given that the overdrive unit is covered in EP90 then I reckon it will unbolt easily so I'm going to try that first.
I replaced the rear crank oil seal on this engine a few years ago so it's the gearbox oil seal that gets my vote - hopefully I'll be able to tell you later today :-)
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