- Access to the gearbox is a simple matter
Last week we made a guess as to why this early E-type wouldn’t shift into 4th gear. That speculation went like this:
“We’re pretty well certain that it’s caused by a previous assembler not lining up the synchronizer inner hub to mainshaft locking plunger with the shaved tooth on the outer sliding hub“.
That surmise was a pretty good one, as the pictures below illustrate
- Mainshaft locking plunger
- not lined up with shaved tooth
On the left you can see the mainshaft locking plunger in the I.D. of the inner hub, and behind it you can also see the relief on the mainshaft splines that form its detent.
Not all of those spline teeth on the inside of the outer hub are the same. If you draw a straight line up thru the plunger bore just to the right of your straight line is … The Shaved Tooth. It’s what we sometimes call an “Ah Ha” moment. Click the picture to enlarge it and you can see what we mean. The tooth profile is concave, the other teeth are plateaued.
- New Triplex windshield for a TR6
While Patrick was having his fun downstairs with the E-type, Steve and Butch put a new windshield in this NYC-based TR6, which belongs to one of our favorite customers. Anyone who pays more to garage their car than I pay for my mortgage is a true car guy.
This car guy has owned his TR6 from new. A good TR6 is easy to like and the only thing that stands between his car and greatness is an overdrive . Something to aspire to someday.
- Not to Sports Car Services specifications
An interesting Austin Healey 3000 Mk II arrived here a week or two ago from New Jersey with instructions to sort it out. John is the technician, and his first step was to sort out the carburetors, as you can gather from the photograph. We can’t find any evidence of rust on the car, which was a surprise because it has all the earmarks of a quickie cosmetic redo, as demonstrated by the paint on the fuel hose in the lower right of the picture.
What is more concerning to us is the red heater hose. Not only is it unattractive, but a close inspection will reveal that there aren’t any protective hose grommets where it passes thru the bulkhead to the heater, which predestines them to an early failure. Grommets get installed today along with new black heater hose, and that is likely to be followed by session II underneath the car.
When I was running the motor hoist for Patrick while he was extracting the E-type engine & TX the phone rang and it was Mike Buononduci calling from South Corinth to say that he had the Jaguar Mk IX steering side rods that we have been on the search for over the last several weeks. Mike has a veritable Aladin’s Cave of obsolete, mostly factory original parts and he is always our first call when we need a complete tail light for a Humber Super Snipe or an outside door handle for an Austin Atlantic.
Your can e-mail Mike at OllyPart@tops-tele.com (the DSL service of the Topsham, Vt. telephone company), or call him at the number below:
- Call Mike at 802-439-5815
