I'm not even going to attempt to list all the vehicles I've had and the tales i could tell around them but one in particular comes to mind. I have mentioned this one before, but it was a while ago so many will not have read about it, for those of you that have I challenge you to notice any discrepancies in my retelling of the tale.
It all came about many years ago when I decided to weld new wings to the front of our, much loved, Datsun (remember them?) 120Y estate. It proved beyond me with my SIP140 stick welder (didn't know back in those days you can't really weld thin car metal with a crude stick welder). Anyway, i handed it over to a pal who taught body repair who took it into his shop to let the trainees get some practical experience. He took both old front wings off and rang me to say there was now so little of the inner wings left he had nothing to weld to and he was amazed the struts hadn't yet come up through the bonnet! She had to go to the happy hunting grounds I'm afraid.
That though left me with a very big problem. It was spring time and Mrs J had decided we were going to France - The Dordogne to be exact - for our summer hols complete with our young family of three kids and all the camping gear. Yikes, now I don't have a car, let alone one big enough to get all that lot into. I started asking around traders I knew to see if they had any "trade cars" I might buy - bought as seen, no comeback once you take it out the door son! Remember those days chaps? After a couple of false starts I was in a small showroom not far from me when the owner said, "probably won't interest you but there's an Ambassador lying at the back of the workshop. It's got gearbox problems but I'll take silly money just to shift it".
It had obviously been lying there for some time, had some parts boxes on it's bonnet and roof and lots of dust. Luckily the windows were wound up so it was clean inside. It looked very good with very little rust etc. I got the engine started quite easily and it ran well. stuck the trade plates on it and it drove well too. I couldn't fault the gearbox which was quiet and shifted as well as any early Leyland gearbox could be expected to! Couldn't believe my luck. I payed the man his money gave it a thorough service and used it to travel to work for the next week or so- all 30mph town driving - and it went beautifully.
Then we decided to go a run in it - a visit my brother down in the borders if I remember - and oh deary me what a final drive whine there was once you got up to above about 45 MPH! No way we could go to France like that.
Convinced it was either crown wheel or pinion bearings I decided the final drive had to be stripped. I started trying to remove the diff housing with the gearbox in place but soon found that wouldn't work so built my own engine hoist to lift the complete power unit out. These were all in one power units like the old Mini/1100 with the gearbox in the sump. Here's a picture of the upper part of the hoist in my garage:
It was made with the help of my friend who, at that time was a north sea gas pipe welder and is made mostly of thick walled steam pipe. He took the main spar into work and put that lovely rt angle bend into it using their massive gas torches. The bottom part is a U shaped stand on wheels, much like an engine crane, so it can be easily moved around. The lifting duties are performed with the block. It's one big drawback is that it has to be dismantled to get it out of the garage, a task which can take half a day and I've only done once! By the way, the old milk cartons are for putting old oil filters in so they don't leak on the floor!
So, having got the power unit out I split the final drive off and found - Nothing! No bearing damage, no teeth badly worn, nothing. Must be the pinion then? but no. Again absolutely nothing, no damage to teeth, lovely smooth bearing, nothing! So, right, let's have the box in pieces then. That's quite a big job on one of these babies because the transfer gear housing has to come off, but a couple of days later everything was mostly in pieces and I couldn't see anything wrong! Lots of tea and thinking. Still convinced it was final drive related as the whine increased directly in relation to road speed (and, by the way I'd done all the usual wheel bearing checks etc) I reassembled it all and started gently turning the input shaft while watching the gear mesh in the different gears and then, quite suddenly, I saw it. The crown wheel and pinion were nothing like as deeply into mesh as they should be, not much more than tip to tip contact. (well not quite, but definitely not deeply enough in mesh) But how can that be? I don't know of any wear which could give this result. I consulted our local gearbox specialist who told me that there were at least 3 different final drive ratios on these depending on engine etc. He thought the most likely scenario was that someone had fitted an unmatched pair of pinion/crownwheel sets, probably to try to get a lower ratio for towing - he'd come across this before and the car had a tow bar. It all ground to a halt at that as I quickly found noone had big heaps of final drive gears just lying around. Everything went on hold as I tried to source parts and then, all of a sudden, I heard from the gearbox guy that a rebuilt gearbox was lying at a gearbox reconditioner in Glasgow. He quoted me a very reasonable price and I swapped my box for his. The rebuild looked good with obviously new synchros and some bearings and all sealed hermetically in cardboard with heavy tape to keep the dirt out - I was impressed.
While all this had been going on I'd been worrying slightly about the engine - 2 litre "0" series - because I thought I could hear a very slight knock in it when under load. Oh damn it! I can't not have a look seeing as how the bottom of the engine is exposed! so I pulled the big end caps and found one had been put on back to front! (No1 or 2 if I remember). which had "wiped" the bearing and lightly scored the journal. Of course then I was worried about the rest of the engine so stripped the lot and found that someone had recently been in here ahead of me. They'd done a bit of a "refresh" and fitted rings, shell bearings and some other stuff. Made quite a nice job of it actually. Shame they put that cap on back to front. So I took the shaft, rods and pistons down to George Brown's - local engineering works who do engine rebuilds and work on marine stuff a lot.
https://georgebrown.co.uk/ They checked the rods and caps and pronounced them ok with good bearing nip. They reground the big ends and "stoned" the mains I reused the main shells as they were neigh on new and Browns got me a set of big ends.In fact they insisted on supplying them so they could match the bearings to the regrind which attention to detail impressed me greatly. In fact I've had other shafts ground by them, notably my Imp ones, and they have always insisted on either supplying the shells themselves or having me hand in the shells before they will grind the shaft.
By now the gearbox had arrived and the engine was built back up again and the holiday date was rapidly approaching. Last minute I decided to renew the needle roller bearings which the idler gear runs in inside the transfer case because the inner one looked a bit worn Proved to be quite difficult as the outer is in a blind hole and both are thin wall type. Anyway, I'd done then before in the garage so I did manage although I didn't have the instalation drifts - used a blowtorch on the casings to expand them!
Several late evenings after work in the garage saw the whole unit back together and the following weekend saw the entire power unit back in the car. Exhaust coupled up and all fluids filled. Hit the starter with the plugs out and the oil light went out very quickly, Hurrah! Plugs back in and she started and ran beautifully. I was fair chuffed with myself!
Better try her down the road then. Oh no! Or words to that effect only "stronger". I can't select first gear! Messed about for a few minutes and found it goes in perfectly with the engine dead but you can't select it with the engine running - it just baulks! Stick it in first and start the engine with the clutch pedal on the floor and she pulls away normally and changes into all other gears perfectly. Just won't select first with engine running and car at a standstill. You can actually get it into first with the car rolling but it's a bit "notchy". Has to be something to do with the first gear synchro doesn't it? But that means the box has to be dismantled again which means the engine has to come out again. This put me in a foul mood for the next few days and I would come home from work and go straight into the garage to work on the car while Mrs J brought me sandwiches etc for my meal. I slept in the living room so as not to keep her awake.
Several days later, and to cut the story short, I discovered this gearbox - so I suppose all of them from the old "B" series 1800 Landcrab right up to the last of the Ambassadors (not sure about the 6 cylinder "E" series?) used a "handed" synchro hub on first/second gear. It only worked properly one way round although it could be fitted facing either direction. Fit it the "wrong" way round and it wouldn't allow synchronous action on the first gear selection! Obviously the reconditioner either didn't know this (I didn't and I worked on these cars every day, but, in fairness, seldom had a gearbox in pieces) or just assembled it wrong. I rang him up and told him what had happened and how much agro it had cause me and he gave me half my money back - which actually was great as other than this he'd done a cracking job on the box. The car ran very well and we went off down the M6, with the kids packed tight into the enormous back seat surrounded by everything including the kitchen sink, across the channel on a ferry to Cherbourg, stopped for a french breakfast of coffee (hot chocolate for the kids) and croisants - Heady stuff back in those days for us young explorers! Then we started the climb up over the hills and down to Nantes. I fancied I could hear a wee "crackling" sort of noise when ever she was pulling hard up the hills. Mrs J noticed me listening to it with the window down and got annoyed. By now I'd convinced myself it was one of the needle rollers on the transfer idler which I'd treated rather roughly hammering them into the casing, beginning to break up. So we parked the car up when we got to our campsite and went around on busses and on foot. Actually it was a lovely holiday but spoiled for me by the worry of the journey home.
Of course we got home absolutely fine but the noise was still there so i decided to take the engine out again and strip the transfer casing off to check on the bearings. To get the engine ready one of the first things is to drop the exhaust off the manifold. Just as it came free I lost my grip on it and it swung down on the rubbers accompanied by exactly the noise I'd been hearing! Stripped the exhaust off the car and stood it on it's end whereupon a medium sized lump of very hard baked exhaust paste rattled and tinkled it's way out onto the ground. My own silly damned fault, In my haste and exhaustion to get everything built up I'd applied too much sealant to the downpipes and some had broken off and got well cooked and was tinkling about inside the exhaust pipe. I suppose whenever the engine was pulling hard that would have produced just the right vibration and gas flow in the pipes to make this strange noise - I was so sure it was that bearing too!
That car went on for many more years until I traded her against a MK2 Vauxhall Astra 1.8 SXI estate which Mrs J never really got the hang off and was frequently seen smoking the front wheels (well one wheel anyway) away from the end of the road!
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