G'day brains trust.. in the process of freshening up this beast and have a couple of issues.. first is tiny but doing my head in.. the nylon gear in the power seats is worn and trying to find new ones is proving to be near impossible,, any suggestions?? also it was previously fitted with 350SBC/350 trans and the sump is hitting drag link.. anyone done this conversion if do how did you get around shortening sump or is this the only option here? Thinking about raising it up on the mounts but trans clearance is looking like an issue.. TIA
No idea on the gear, you might search for one for a Ford from similar years. On the sump, first thing I would do is find a stock 55 Merc and measure from the center of the crank to the crossmemember and compare with what yours measures out to. That way you will know if it is sitting too low in the chassis. In other news you might look at the motor mounts to make sure they aren't collapsed. Here guys might modify the center link but I don't even suggest thinking about doing that there, That doesn't mean that the pan can't be reworked or swapped for a pan that isn't as deep at the front. Thinking of that, different applications for SBC engines use pans of different depths at the front. A straight edge held level across the bottom of the pan and a ruler to measure from the pan rail on the block down and some snooping might find a pan for a local to OZ vehicle that fits better.
The problem with the oil pan is the Chev motor is rear sump and Ford products of that vintage are front sump. Best bet will be a modified or custom pan. Early V8 Chevy 2s had a front sump pan, maybe somebody is repo-ing that and it may fit. I don't see much out there for power seat parts, maybe trying something like this is worth a try.... Car Seat 12vdc Gear Motor (sciplus.com) ... It's cheap enough.... LOL.
I put a 350 Chevy with a 700 R4 in my 54 Mercury convertible you used to be able to buy a dropped drag link. I dropped my own buy welding a thick piece of Steel on either side of the drag link that hung down low enough to clear the oil pan then welded a Solid Steel rod across the bottom before cutting the original Center out of the drag link. You must turn the wheel from side to side before welding the drop down pieces on either side of the oil pan to make sure you have the proper clearance.
If you can get the gear out of the seat, try to match it up with a catalog gear. Look at places like McMaster Carr or Boston Gear. For the pan, I have a SBC in my Ford and I used an aftermarket Chevy II pan, which was a POS and I needed to silver-solder cracked corners. I also had to relocate the drain, it was right up against the cross member.
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