Build Day 152.....Gearbox Assembly

Got to work with the final assembly of the gearbox, ready to fit. Bolted up the bell housing to the box with the finished adapter plates. I then tested gear selection, but there was a slight problem with the stub of the selector shaft catching on the plates. There is a hole in two of the plates inside which the shaft moves, but I needed to enlarge one of them to stop the shaft fouling. Once done, I bolted it all up again and the gear change is now fine. The bolts were torqued up to the correct settings as per the original cars they were from (70Nm for the bolts into the gearbox and 45Nm for the bolts into the bell housing). The bolts also had threadlock applied to them for good measure.

I then went on to getting the release bearing and it's actuator mechanism sorted. I'd forgotten I hadn't done anything to this since I'd stripped it off the Rover, so I had to clean and paint it. It'll be ready to go on after the paint is dry.

Lastly, I fitted the gearstick extender to the back of the box. This moves the gearstick back a few inches to put it in a more comfortable position for the driver. Here's the box as it looks now:





I'd bought this extender device more than a year ago, but had not really had it out of the box since. It fitted OK and seems to work fine, except that the lock mechanism that stops you selecting reverse without first pressing down on the stick did not work. This could be very dangerous if you can accidentally select reverse instead of 1st. Looking at it, the lug that forms this lock is not in the correct position. It needs to be widened by 5mm or so:



Oh well, should be sorted easily with the grinder and the welder, but that job's for another day.

Build Day 151.....Gearbox Adapter Plates #3 + Clean Engine

Finally finished the adapter plates here:



I then turned my attention to the engine. The engine is one thing off the donor cars that I didn't really need to do anything with. It's relatively low mileage and in good condition, so I didn't need to re-built it or anything. Instead, I've just cleaned it up a little:




So I'm getting close to being able to put the engine on now. Just need to get a spigot bearing bush made up and I'm ready.

Build Day 149 & 150.....Gearbox Adapter Plates #2

Continued to work on making the adapter plates. A lot more effort involved than with the wood prototypes. Anyway, almost done now. Just need to neaten then up and I'll post some pics.