Fireside Valiant chat
So today I decided to take a change of clothes with me to my office job and change on the way out to go get dirty and do some hunting....car parts hunting that is.
I received a tip about a man locally who was said to have an 833 OD transmission out of a Volare for sale. I has reservations about replacing the three speed manual on hand with a Volare OD because I have heard bad things about aluminum cased ODs. However, I research the topic of bushing the countershaft and found several threads and it seems a lot of people have the opinion an aluminum cased OD is plenty strong yet others claim to have had them fall apart really easy......WE may never know how much of that is real world in a reasonable context.
So I get there and the man has at least 7 4 speeds in a row on a shelf but they are all the ball and trunion type. I actually entertained the idea of using a ball and trunion in the valiant since that is what it had originally and the man also has a number of drive shafts available that would work. At the end of the row was a cast iron truck OD with the long tail shaft.
So now the options were to go Ball and trunion or long shaft OD and change the tail shaft over.
With the ball and trunion ...The Con: what is going to happen if the U-joint goes bad...is that something I can replace?? The driveshaft available will work with the 7 1/4 but if I ever upgrade rear ends ??? The other problem with the ball and trunion is the 3.5 inch bearing retainer. So now I would need to buy a bell housing to a slant with the small bearing hole, shame too because I already have a nice OD bell. The small bearing retainer bell housings are available but not really all that common. Brewers has one listed right now but for 3 bills. So that is a con on the side of the ball and trunion.
The positive on the ball and trunion is a strong early 60's vintage four speed with the one to one final gear.
But then I had to think, is the temptation of a one to one final gear something I should cloud my judgement with ?? I mean, had he had a short shaft OD ...I would have been loaded up already and on my way home happy.
The con of the long shaft OD is : I need to put more money into converting it to the short shaft. however, between ebay and brewers, all the parts I would need for the conversion are around.
The positive of the long shaft OD is: I can use that long tail shaft housing on another 4 speed for another car and save me some $ on another build because those dual mount tail shafts are worth some coin because that is the ticket for the E-body crowd. The other positive is that it's from a truck so its the strong 30 spline output and the cast iron case which circumvents my original concern over the rigidity of the aluminum case.
So I went back after thinking and looking up on ebay what is available and stuck a deal on the long shaft OD for 2 bills .........then I looked over and noticed one of the ball and trunion transmissions had a shifter and linkage, so I asked how much for just the shifter. It was thrown in the deal for 2 bills, so that was a SCORE!!!
So now I need to crack this baby open and evaluate what I need to convert to short shaft and go through it. So here is the birth of the part of the driveline for Princess valiant.
The shifter is definitely the early type with the bolt on handle. So now I just need to get a handle and that whole thing one less thing to worry about
So today I decided to take a change of clothes with me to my office job and change on the way out to go get dirty and do some hunting....car parts hunting that is.
I received a tip about a man locally who was said to have an 833 OD transmission out of a Volare for sale. I has reservations about replacing the three speed manual on hand with a Volare OD because I have heard bad things about aluminum cased ODs. However, I research the topic of bushing the countershaft and found several threads and it seems a lot of people have the opinion an aluminum cased OD is plenty strong yet others claim to have had them fall apart really easy......WE may never know how much of that is real world in a reasonable context.
So I get there and the man has at least 7 4 speeds in a row on a shelf but they are all the ball and trunion type. I actually entertained the idea of using a ball and trunion in the valiant since that is what it had originally and the man also has a number of drive shafts available that would work. At the end of the row was a cast iron truck OD with the long tail shaft.
So now the options were to go Ball and trunion or long shaft OD and change the tail shaft over.
With the ball and trunion ...The Con: what is going to happen if the U-joint goes bad...is that something I can replace?? The driveshaft available will work with the 7 1/4 but if I ever upgrade rear ends ??? The other problem with the ball and trunion is the 3.5 inch bearing retainer. So now I would need to buy a bell housing to a slant with the small bearing hole, shame too because I already have a nice OD bell. The small bearing retainer bell housings are available but not really all that common. Brewers has one listed right now but for 3 bills. So that is a con on the side of the ball and trunion.
The positive on the ball and trunion is a strong early 60's vintage four speed with the one to one final gear.
But then I had to think, is the temptation of a one to one final gear something I should cloud my judgement with ?? I mean, had he had a short shaft OD ...I would have been loaded up already and on my way home happy.
The con of the long shaft OD is : I need to put more money into converting it to the short shaft. however, between ebay and brewers, all the parts I would need for the conversion are around.
The positive of the long shaft OD is: I can use that long tail shaft housing on another 4 speed for another car and save me some $ on another build because those dual mount tail shafts are worth some coin because that is the ticket for the E-body crowd. The other positive is that it's from a truck so its the strong 30 spline output and the cast iron case which circumvents my original concern over the rigidity of the aluminum case.
So I went back after thinking and looking up on ebay what is available and stuck a deal on the long shaft OD for 2 bills .........then I looked over and noticed one of the ball and trunion transmissions had a shifter and linkage, so I asked how much for just the shifter. It was thrown in the deal for 2 bills, so that was a SCORE!!!
So now I need to crack this baby open and evaluate what I need to convert to short shaft and go through it. So here is the birth of the part of the driveline for Princess valiant.
The shifter is definitely the early type with the bolt on handle. So now I just need to get a handle and that whole thing one less thing to worry about
