Ok, I'm not ignorant on these, but this is something I've never seen come up. I'm hoping either someone has tried some of this or has compared parts. Stick bellhousings. As near as I can tell, there's four types. Car bells, in '58-64 narrow trans pattern and '65-70 wide pattern, and light truck bells, same years except it hung around later in the trucks going to '76. But when you go looking for one, about all you see are either the early car or late truck versions. The late truck is deeper than the car and presents some fitment issues with passenger car trans. The early car design saddles you will the somewhat unreliable Bendix starter, uses a different flywheel tooth count, and complicates using newer trans. The early flywheel is a different part number, but I'm not sure what the difference is. I'm looking at a '60 Ford car with FE power that was a stick but the current owner swapped it out for a Cruisomatic. He has all the clutch parts including the bell/flywheel/etc, so I'd like to swap it back but upgrade to a TKO. Now I realize that the easy way out is a $800 Quicktime bell, but there's a $200 TKO adaptor available for the early bell and saving $600 works for me. I'm semi-sure I'd have to replace the flywheel also. I'm not going racing, so blow-proof isn't an issue. So my questions are these... Is it possible to use the later starter on the early bell? I've had enough failures on the Bendix units to understand why Ford got rid of it and the quality of the current replacements leave something to be desired. If it's a flywheel mismatch preventing this, will the later flywheel fit into the early bell? Or is the only difference the ring gear? If it's starter location issue, would if be possible to plug/redrill the bell? Possibly along with a flywheel swap? Any info on this appreciated, photos showing the differences really appreciated Or just use a late truck bell/flywheel?
Patience Grasshopper ,,,,,they are out there . Just not online at this time,,,,,,many talented FE guys here . Tommy
So Steve, what if you located a complete Flywheel, clutch, bellhousing, with all of the mounting hardware, taken off a 67 Mustang GT. I parted one out 47 years ago, been in my attic ever since. Don't know what a realistic price is, but it might be available.
No expert however my 64 427FE uses the early narrow pattern passenger car T10 bolted to OEM early cast bellhousing. However it uses a later model starter with a 184t flywheel. Early Bendix starters were used with 156t flywheel. I'm currently swapping in a period correct early narrow pattern RC Ind bellhousing and adding a block plate. Early starter Later starter Below is an early butterfly style dual bolt Top-loader bolt transmission, I believe your TKO transmission will feature the wider bolt pattern.
If you use a later flywheel with the earlier bellhousing I think you can use the later starter,I heard the two flywheels have a different tooth count and the starter needs to match the flywheel.
Sorry I'm late to the party. I just got a refresher to this exact issue (more or less) 2 weeks ago. Long story but easy cure (more or less). My project is 57 Forde Car FE and starter clearance for my Home built Headers. There are actually 2 different early bellhousings. 58-59 and 60-64. Both use long Bendix shaft starters. They are hard to get and a P.I.A. to change and eat up a lot or realestate I needed for exhaust. My cure was Mini High Torque and clocked the motor down and inboard. It was a must that I could change it out without pulling headers. The starter was listed for early FE flywheel. Used all my early pre 65 parts and had everything balanced by my Machine Shop buddy Ted King. Get down to final assembly and Ring Gear to Bindix count is wrong. Decided to contact Starter supplyer and get correct Bindix to find out they don't make one for my ring gear no matter what I was sold. The easy Fix once sorted out was a new 65 up Ring Gear installed on the early flywheel. Knock off the Old one and a little heat and the new one dropped right in place. End of issue. The difference in early and late pre 65 bellhousings is the angel the Fork comes out of the Bellhousing. 61-64 in a 57-59 Car and the pushrod angle is not flat from bellcrank to fork and causes leverage issues and clutch chatter due to the bearing not hitting P.P. fingers dead on flat. Hope this helps
Also be aware that the front bearing retainer on pre 65 trannys is smaller than 65 up. If your using a dual bolt pattern gear box you need to turn off the OD I think it was 1/8" and use socket head bolts to get in the hole in the Bellhousing.
The guy on here who's buddy is the Ford guru hasn't checked in since 2014. I'm sure that Keith retired from Tom Denchel Ford in Prosser years ago but he was/is the Ford parts and what fits what guru. He was the parts manager for them for years and worked in parts there from not long after he got home from Nam. Fords made after the Y block era always drive me nuts as everything is "this setup only" Meaning "did that come out of a red Mustang or a blue Mustang" .
There are only 3 or 4 pitch and tooth count starter pinions. Most know a 168 and 153 Chev use the same starter pinion. My 139 tooth GMC used the same starter pinion as a Nissan 240 Z. Normally it is the location that makes the difference. I was told this by a starter shop.
Alright, the HAMB comes through!!! I figured there was a solution, but it's been 20+ years since I seriously screwed around with a FE. I've always found that you could do more than is commonly thought when parts swapping, but finding the right combo can be challenging... Big thanks to all!
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