Well, as many of you remember (and most of you probably not) I have
been having trouble with my TR6 starter. The problem started (or
didn't start) about 6 months ago. Sometimes the starter would engage,
other times, just a bit of grinding on the flywheel. The plan was to
rebuild the starter once the weather got warmer. Seeing that it's now
July, and the starter just spins with no engagement whatsoever, it
became time to pull the beast.
A trip down to the starter/alternator shop, and one drive gear later,
I reinstalled the starter. Click, spinnnnnnnn... (Oh no...) Click,
spinnnnnnnn. *#&$&&@!
*sigh* I take the starter back to the shop and the the owner says,
"Well, it must be your starter ring. This starter is fine." See, I
installed the drive gear myself, so I wasn't as sure as he that the
starter was fine. But, he checked it out and yes, it worked just
great. Damn...
Sooooo. I head back to the TR6 and fell inside the starter hole. No,
I mean I felt inside the starter hole. The ring gear has slid back
about 1/2" on the fly wheel. Arrrg! I went and check the anti-seize
tube, and sure enough the cap was stuck on the tube. I guess this
means the trans must come out of the car. (again) (Roland, please
don't tell me you told you so, because you did. :-) I think the
starter pushed the ring gear on the flywheel back and when I fixed the
starter, it had already pushed back the starter ring.
Well, the car just happen to make its last trip to the Buja mechanical
palace which is just fine as there's no way I would want to pull the
trans in my apartment parking lot. (again) Yesterday, Lawrence and I
pulled the trans... We had the trans out in less than 1 hour. (Yeah,
see I told you I've pulled this trans several times.) For those of
you who don't have air tools, (like me), you must get a 3/8" battery
SKIL ratchet wrench. The battery lasted the up to the last flywheel
bolt (at which point it died), and we worked it almost continuously
for the hour.
Now I'm going to find a shop to heat the starter ring and get this
sucker secured. Anyone got tips on making sure this doesn't happen
again? (superglue?, jbweld? :-)
SP: I can pull that trans in 3 hours...
LB: I can pull that trans in 2 hours...
SP: I can pull that trans in 1 hour...
LB: Pull that trans!
-Scotty (paisley@bldrdoc.gov)
|