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Old 07-20-2021, 09:12 PM
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bhill86 bhill86 is offline
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Default Super T10 input shaft bearing

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.

  #2  
Old 07-22-2021, 01:13 AM
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Hoodshaker Hoodshaker is offline
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I rebuilt mine 6 years ago in the kitchen using a 3lb hammer, some wood blocks, and an adjustable width stand I made out of the metal legs of my ikea desk and some all-thread. The proper diameter pipe that just clears the main shaft diameter is a useful tool for driving components off and on the shaft in lieu of a press.

I had a thumping coming from below that I first though was the u-joint but once I changed those I realized it had to be either the front or mid plate bearing in the trans.

At the time I used some videos of tear down and rebuild of a Muncie by Paul Cangialosi, which largely goes together the same way. Since then he's done a tear down and install vid for the Richmond Super T10.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhUJD2PBmE0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYULq42H8Eo

I bought the rebuild kit from his site, https://www.5speeds.com/

Richmond has a great exploded view in their service manual https://www.richmondgear.com/wp-cont..._MANUAL_v2.pdf

Lots of this info and more is in this book (also by Cangiaosi) but i was able to find some critical passages along with other info online so I didn't buy the book. https://www.amazon.com/Muncie-4-Spee.../dp/1613251068

I'd never opened a transmission before and I felt like i had invented fire when I got it all back together. Real Castaway kind of moment. Good luck!

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Old 07-22-2021, 10:11 AM
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Awesome, thanks for your response. I’ve watched those videos from Paul probably half a dozen times each. Actually, on the one video I commented and he actually responded saying the bearings can survive with low oil and it’s the gears that can get damaged but since my oil didn’t get REAL low or for very long as far as I can tell, I’m hoping once I replace the gaskets and refill I’ll be in the clear. We’ll see.

Worst case, i remove the trans down the road and diagnose and replace as necessary.

I think I can make my own puller if necessary but just curious how you got the input bearing out. Did you remove the mainshaft first or were you able to pull it out of the front?

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Old 07-22-2021, 02:38 PM
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Ok, switching up the question a bit now for you or anyone else willing to chime in. I got the trans out today, side cover and tailcover off. Replaced all of my seals and what-not but I’m not so sure about this reverse idler gear and thrust washer. To my untrained eye this looks like excessive wear to me. Would you agree?

The first picture is the back of the thrust washer as it sits on the gear, second is the face of the washer that makes contact with the gear and third is obviously the case. It seems to me that the washer should have a tang sticking out to fit into the notch in the case to prevent it from spinning. But even if that were the case why is there so much wear between the washer and gear?
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Old 07-22-2021, 03:22 PM
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On the front bearing- it's been a while but as I recall I was able to shimmy it similar to how it's described and illustrated in this PDF download hosted over on the Corvette Forum. https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-fisher-sm.pdf

On the reverse gear and washers-I'm no expert but at least in the photos that looks pretty bad. I recall those surfaces being smooth as ice. Glad to hear Paul replied to your question on the video. I sent him a question or two through his site before I bought the rebuild kit and he responded and was very responsive and helpful them too. That may be worth a try. support@5speeds.com

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Old 07-22-2021, 04:25 PM
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John Milner John Milner is offline
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I had one that made a noise while the car was sitting there idling. I swapped in new bearings/needle bearings/thrust washers all throughout the transmission and it is quiet now. I would recommend giving this a try yourself if you have some mechanical ability, which it appears that you do. It's not all that difficult and could be done easily in a weekend if you already have it out.

The thrust washer that goes in between the tail housing and reverse gear should have a tang on it that fits in the groove of the tail housing. To me, it looks like the thrust washer did likely have a tang but it was not placed in the case with the tang in the groove and was spinning. There is also a thrust washer that is supposed to go in front of the idler gear inside of the case. If this was left out, there could have been some slack in the idler gear, which allowed the thrust washer that fits in the tail housing to come out of the groove and start spinning. This is just a guess but maybe they did not get the tang in the groove like they should have or left the washer out in the case and the thrust washer started spinning in the tail housing and it scarred the back of your gear up.

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Old 07-22-2021, 04:37 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Hoodshaker View Post
On the front bearing- it's been a while but as I recall I was able to shimmy it similar to how it's described and illustrated in this PDF download hosted over on the Corvette Forum. https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-fisher-sm.pdf

On the reverse gear and washers-I'm no expert but at least in the photos that looks pretty bad. I recall those surfaces being smooth as ice. Glad to hear Paul replied to your question on the video. I sent him a question or two through his site before I bought the rebuild kit and he responded and was very responsive and helpful them too. That may be worth a try. support@5speeds.com
Thanks again for your response. Hopefully I don’t have to worry about getting that front bearing out in the future. I’ve been looking around for a replacement thrust washer and I can NOT find on for the life of me with the exception of them being included in two kits costing $50 and over $100. Don’t really wanna spend $50+ on a washer so I have to keep digging around.

I did email Paul but may try to call him tomorrow if I don’t hear back.

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Old 07-22-2021, 04:43 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by John Milner View Post
I had one that made a noise while the car was sitting there idling. I swapped in new bearings/needle bearings/thrust washers all throughout the transmission and it is quiet now. I would recommend giving this a try yourself if you have some mechanical ability, which it appears that you do. It's not all that difficult and could be done easily in a weekend if you already have it out.

The thrust washer that goes in between the tail housing and reverse gear should have a tang on it that fits in the groove of the tail housing. To me, it looks like the thrust washer did likely have a tang but it was not placed in the case with the tang in the groove and was spinning. There is also a thrust washer that is supposed to go in front of the idler gear inside of the case. If this was left out, there could have been some slack in the idler gear, which allowed the thrust washer that fits in the tail housing to come out of the groove and start spinning. This is just a guess but maybe they did not get the tang in the groove like they should have or left the washer out in the case and the thrust washer started spinning in the tail housing and it scarred the back of your gear up.
I may regret it in the future but I’m going to take a chance on not replacing the bearings for now and see what happens once it’s back together and filled with the proper amount of fluid. It’s quiet enough that you wouldn’t hear it I don’t think unless your were paying attention which gives me hope the sound was just not muffled like it would be if there was the proper amount of fluid. If not, I’ll pull it again in the future. It wasn’t all that difficult to get to this point.

The reverse thrust washer in the case is still there. I agree it looks like the reverse idler gear thrust washer I posted did have a tang. It’s entirely possible that shop slapped everything back together (for the third or fourth time by the end) quickly and didn’t orient it correctly. I think I’ve decided to replace the reverse idler gear and that thrust washer but I can’t find any washers yet. My feeling is, with the tang on the washer, the grooves in the case shouldn’t cause any issues that I can think of.

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Old 07-22-2021, 06:15 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bhill86 View Post
..... I think I’ve decided to replace the reverse idler gear and that thrust washer but I can’t find any washers yet. ....
If you look at the exploded view in the manual of the Richmond that I posted earlier you''ll find a service parts list. I think item number 6 is your idler thrust washer and the table below it identifies their part number as T1088A, which Summit (and I'm sure other places) has in stock for $2.99. https://www.summitracing.com/parts/rmg-t1088a

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Old 07-22-2021, 06:27 PM
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That’s the forward most thrust washer I believe. In the main case with the reverse idler gear. I think the equivalent in that diagram of what I’m looking for is #15 and 54 which, from watching Paul’s videos, he explains that the new Richmond tail cases come without the groove near the reverse idler shaft and require a new setup of a flat thrust washer, then thrust bearing the another flat thrust washer. I think that’s what that diagram represents. I’m having trouble finding the washer with the tang.

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Old 07-23-2021, 11:08 AM
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I ended up emailing Paul and he responded asking me to call him which I did this morning. In short, he suggested cleaning up the back of that gear and the shaft with some sandpaper and he had a correct washer in stock that just wasn’t listed on his site so that’s on its way and I should be set.

Thanks for your guys’ help.

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Old 07-23-2021, 03:16 PM
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That's great news! You'll be banging gears again in no time.

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Old 07-23-2021, 03:46 PM
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Hope so!

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Old 04-29-2023, 02:08 PM
97kenworth 97kenworth is offline
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I just pulled my superT 10 and when I split the tail stock I found virtually the exact same damage as your pictures show. I realize this is from years ago but I hope that by some stroke of luck that you still will see this post.

After cleaning up the damage and installing with the new tanged thrust washer, how did it turn out? I'm concerned that the spinning washer has worn a groove so deep that installing a new washer will make no difference.

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Old 04-29-2023, 07:29 PM
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Doesn’t seem to have made a difference for me. From what was explained to me this is probably pretty coming as a result of years of slow rolling forward while shifting into reverse causing a bit of grinding. The material ground off falls into this area eventually causing scoring.

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