I have a '66 Chevy long bed pickup with a 327 and a saginaw 4sp. About two years ago I had the tranny rebuilt at the same time the was engine rebuilt. After the tranny was installed, with a new clutch, throwout bearing and roller pilot bearing, I was not able to downshift into 2nd...it would grind. Everything else was fine. Three months ago, I pulled the tranny and took it back to the mechanic that rebuilt it. He said that the synchro had broke. He repaired it and I reinstalled the tranny. It worked great for the past three months, until today. I was at a stop light in neutral and when I tried to shift it into 1st gear, it would not go in at first. After a few tries, it finally went in. When I pulled away, the clutch pedal began vibrating very loudly. When I pushed the clutch pedal in, the vibrating would stop. No problem shifting into 2nd. When I tried to shift into 3rd, it would grind a little. When I shifted it to 4th, there was no 4th. After a few throws back and forth, 4th would finally engage. Every time I try shifting into 4th, this happens. No matter what gear it's in, the clutch pedal vibrates very loudly. When I depress the clutch, nothing feels out of the ordinary. What could be wrong?
Sounds like a problem with the clutch. If the clutch doesnt disengage properly you'll have problems getting the tranny in any gear and it will grind like hell going into reverse. It will also wear on the syncros till they fail.
This morning, I checked the linkage and adjusted the clutch. I'm still having the same problem. The clutch pedal still rattles loudly and I can find 4th about 1 in 20 tries. Even when I manually put the tranny in 4th from underneath, I still get nothing...most of the time. FYI, I have no problem getting it into 1st, 2nd, 3rd and reverse.
I"d pull the trans. Take the side cover off. Check the 3-4 Shift fork. The3-4 slider. If there ok , look at the input shaft. I bet it"s broken or the front bearing is toast. It"s got to come out anyway....Saginaw"s like to break the input and cluster when abused (just saying) Brian..
I only run the pilot bushing not the pilot bearing. Never had a problem with the bushing but father in-law has had problems with the bearing style. Not saying this is your problem, just saying I have heard of the bearing type failing.
the pilot bearing fell apart. or broke the input shaft at the nose where it goes into the bearing. this causes the input shaft to wobble around. So when you try for 4th gear the mainshft and input shaft are not exactly concentric and parallel. So the slider can't engage. once and a while it lines up. Pull the trans before you break something expensive. Or the ball bearing under the input bearing retainer went away or the locknut backed off. Either way, out it comes.
Since 4th is just a coupling of the input and output shaft I would say check input bearing and also the pilot bearing. Sound like the disc is running out of center and 4th would be a bitch to get that way.
GasPumper got there first. Also another thing, since that Sag was opened up again. The needle bearing in the input shaft for the main shaft may be an issue also. 1 missing or 2 missing and the rest failed.
So the mechanic who rebuilt the tranny says that the input shaft bearing, along with various other parts, is shot. He claims the reason is that my bell housing is a truck bell housing and the tranny is from a car. He says that the hole in the bell housing is too large for the tranny. Can this be the case or is it a line of bull shit?
Who put it together? Quite often there is a mis-match between front bearing retainers and bellhousing bores when you do a mix-n-match build. I think it would have to loosen up the transmission to the bellhousing before anything else would happen. Was the transmission loose? I've turned down front bearing retainers on a lathe, I've swapped them around and made rings to take up the slack when I had to. Bob
Yup, the outside of the bearing retainer needs to positively engage the bellhousing. this is what lines everything up. I believe there are spacers out there to fix it, or just get the correct bellhousing on evilbay, the car ones are dirt cheap, just make sure you get the larger one to clear the 12" (been awhile isn't that the larger clutch?) clutch. Scot
I know I've seen the spacers online, I just whip one up when I need it. I now use nothing but big-clutch truck clutches and bellhousings, saves me lots of problems in the long run. Some guys here (the freakin' gods that they are..) can recite casting numbers and bore sizes from memory. I'm not one of them. Bob
There are stronger trans out there than a Muncie and they will get Fucked up just as bad if you don't index them correctly.
The Sag will accept either a small or large bearing retainer. Ask the Trans guy if he has large retainer in his parts pile. Have him put it on and keep your small one for the future.
All the ones I seem to have around at the time are always the wrong size! But they do swap back and forth, good point. Bob
I run a four speed Saginaw behind a truck bell housing not a problem. I had the Saginaw behind a 235 and now a 261. I would question your mechanic
If you just go to evilbay and type in chevy bellhousing you will get hudreds of hits. I was close, I need to go back and correct my other post on size. Looks like the performance GM car bellhousing (typically came on big blocks and fits small blocks fine) is for an 11" clutch. Non-performance or standard is 10.5". The performance one is actually really easy to spot in person like at swap meets. On the 10.5" the top of the bellhousing tapers pretty smoothly down to the transmission. O'n the larger bells, they kind of hump out on the top, then drop sharply down to the trans. Look at the pics on evilbay and you will see the difference right away. Scot
Clutch size is not the factor here as I read all the post's. Just to keep things simple, I'm going to word it as such. There are 2 sizes of Index holes we our dealing with on the Chevy bellhousing, 5 1/8" and 4 5/8". What the trans guy is saying, He has a 4 5/8" bearing retainer in a 5 1/8" bellhousing hole.
Yeah. He was asking in an earlier post about just putting a car bellhousing, or in your terms, the 4 5/8" bellhousing in his truck what should he look for basically, and I was explaining to him the two different options in car bellhousings. All I was saying is always try and get the bigger bellhousing cause it gives you more room for a bigger clutch. You and I went to the same place, we just took two different roads to get there Scot
See if you can get a different bearing retainer, (If yours doesn't fit the bellhousing) that matches the bell housing. Someone mentioned bell housing to engine alignment...that is a biggie.......One of those "hard way" lessons i learned......... 4TTRUK
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