[bhill86]

So I have a 77 T/A that I converted to a 4 speed using a ST10 out of a 76 T/A. To try to make a long story short, although the trans had allegedly been rebuilt it was noisy and I took it to a local shop to be rebuilt a few years ago. (Big mistake). I had a lot of issues with that shop and subsequently the trans including new noise it hadn’t been making, popping out of 2nd gear and several “rebuilds” to make it right. And it ended up ok until it started leaking last year.

I used some stop leak which seemed to help until about a week or two ago when I noticed it was leaking again. There was fluid on the underside of the car but none dripped off on to my floor so I didn’t think it was a ton. I decided to remove it and replace the output shaft seal, tail cover seal (and fix a buggered up speedo drive gear the shop caused or ignored) side cover seal and the shifter shaft seals. I may ignore the main case seal since it doesn’t seem to be leaking and it will save me quite a bit of hassle.

Here’s the issue though. This past Sunday I took the car for a nice hour long ride and when I got back I noticed the slightest bit of noise while idling in neutral. Today I got the car in the air and was unable to feel any fluid with my finger inside of the fill plug so I know fluid got low, just don’t know how low.

Here’s my question. I lack a press and the proper puller to remove and reinstall the input shaft bearing. I wonder what condition the needle bearings too really. I also called a few local shops just to see if they’d remove/reinstall the bearing for me but nobody wants to play ball. Anyone have any backyard tricks to getting the bearing out and reinstalled or would you even consider doing the gasket replacement, slap it back in, fill it and see whether or not it’s still making noise. I thought it MIGHT be possible the noise was just because there wasn’t enough fluid in contact with the bearing but I don’t know.

Any advice would be appreciated.