Last year I had a build thread posted here highlighting us saving my wife's grandpa's 53 customline club coupe as well as me and the kid getting her all fixed up and working again. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/just-picked-up-a-family-project.1258568/ We had a long summer of good times in it as a family and I had my head filled with plans of further custom work such as dual exhaust, fixing wiring, lowering a few inches etc... When it all got shut down by a sudden overdrive failure. I let that build a wall between me getting out there and doing something about it all winter and now that's it's getting nice I had the garage door open and opened my belly to a few whiskeys and gained a little motivation to pull the trans... And pull the trans I did. I learned all the hard lessons you learn when you do something you work on a new part of the car like the 1 bolt you are trying to listen last that would have been easier to get at before, and the mount that need to come off before the trans is out to clear the cross member, and lastly the OD has oil in after you drain the trans so now your wearing it. But the most important lesson I learned was reading about what you doing instead of letting the whiskey say, "look it's only a few bolts and you'll know what wrong". Yeah I tried to seperate the OD from the trans and the second I heard a metallic clank I knew I messed up. Now I have to re assemble the trans as a payment for my stupidity haha. On the bright side I'll get familiar with it for future work and I might have to do something about this chipped gear. I have to inspect a little more but it's overall pretty clean. After my coffee I'm going to go out and actually sperate the OD and figure out what's wrong. After I messed up last night I had to walk away And sleep on it. Dreamt of all the things I want to do once we get the OD all patched up. I have the 54 c pillar trim to do, I have the rear lowering stuff and need to get the front end parts to tighten up the front suspension and lower it, also plan on building a dual exhaust using the stock manifolds and hopfully some custom stainless tips. I'll be updating the OD problem thread as I figure it out but I wanted. To get another build thread going for this year's adventures. Last time I did youtube videos... Yay or nay?
Well my morning coffee is worn off and I. Wish I had whiskey in it because after reading the book 5 times finding a video of someone taking it apart I'm worried I've got a situation on my hands because something has got the od stick together. The lock out lever pin came right out but the lever will not come out all the way and the OD will not seperate more than a 1/4". I'm not sure if this is due to the lockout lever being suck in there or something else. I guess I need to go ham sandwich on the lever and get it out. I did just rad my find a OD trans from Mercury 1 town over for 200 bucks. Might be worth picking up for spare parts at this point.
Just take a big breath, they’re not that difficult. I did my first T-85 o/d in 1967, I was 17, and it was the first transmission I ever had apart. If you haven’t seen it yet, here’s a link to the BW manual, applies to all the o/d units. http://www.oldwillysforum.com/forum/TechData/BWOverdriveManual.pdf It’s not easy reading, but all the info you need is there. Your next source for parts is Mac at Van Pelt sales. He just advised someone over at the Ford Barn that’s what happens when you pull the o/d from an assembled transmission. So don’t feel alone. http://www.vanpeltsales.com/. He’s on here as Mac VP. Good luck.
Thanks, I hadn't found that manual yet so I'll give that one a read too. I have vanpelt book marked already and. I've used that site trying to figure this out. I wasn't afraid going into it becIse I've had a few transmissions apart from old Harleys to Chevy transmissions and always figured it out. I'm just worried because I followed the instructions that I could find and it's not coming apart at they show. I'll get it eventually. I posted this up on Ford barn also. Thanks for the reply.
Welp.... Doesn't take a mechanic to know what's wrong here. Sort of bummed about this find but at least I've gotten to the bottom of it. To get it out I had to spread the snap ring that holds the tailshaft in and tap it out from the rear. Vanpelt sales was helpful in the tip to get it seperated. I will say that as much as I love the 3 speed With OD I'm sort of worried about this failure and the fact that these parts are pretty limited. Considering how much we use the car I feel bad using up a depleting resource but I suppose that's the game.
This explains not being able to seperate it, major carnage had the two peices jammed together which is what I feared most. Trans main shaft also missing some chunks. Guess pulling the trans part was going to happen anyways. Going to have to get her all cleaned up and start making a parts list. Manual is in the mail for the OD so I need to pick up a trans on as well and make the best of it. I guess this gives me some other stuff to work on while we have this little issue under works.
At least you have a game plan. Look in the market place here, maybe someone got a decent used box, make 1 out of the 2. Lots of older Ford parts in The Ford Barn classifieds.
Hot rodding at its finest..... Enjoy the diggin in, that's as much fun as driving! Whiskey is a great motivator for me too, lol. Cheers to that.
Wow, I've never seen an overdrive gear set fail like that. Looks like it may have seen some abuse in the past.
I'm a member over there so I plan to take a look there. I did find a used one on Facebook that I'm waiting to hear back about. I figure between the two and maybe some parts from Van pelt I can make something that's works.
The known history I have is being bought and driven home from OH to IL in about 1984 and then is was basically only driven to and from car shows. Been sitting in a garage for the last probably 15 years or so until we bought it from my wife's family and got it going last year. We put probably 2-3k miles on it last summer alone. I think I underestimated the oil leak and ran it low on oil honestly.
That is a spectacular gear failure. Hope you're able to find replacements. Would be well worth it, the overdrive gear makes the car so much easier to drive.
If I'm not mistaken the OD cars had a lower gear ratio in the rear. Without the OD they are not much good past 50. I miss being able to cruise at 65 all day so I. Going to do what I need to do to make it work again.
"whiskey motivation" I was expecting a hot Y-block ala 1958 Thunder Road. Riding dirt bikes was funner, well at least very fun, with buddies and beer. An acquaintance who ran a Triumph motorcycle shop could often be found at the hydraulic press straightening customers' forks. I don't know if he actually wrote "drunken wheelies" on the repair ticket like he said.
I had a thunderbird OHC slip through my hands last year because I was thinking about an engine swap. I do love the flathead and the 3 speed though.
My '53s were convert and Victoria. My coupes were all '54, 11 of 'em. I love 'em. Your coupe is beautiful, a real head-turner. I converted my '53 Vic (a mild custom) to OHV (SBF) and C4 automatic tranny. THEN I wished I had just replaced the cracked block flathead! LOVED that overdrive...
Update, I found an alleged 50 mercury 3 speed with OD. Based on asking around I believe this is the same OD but the trans is slightly different with a 1 peice bell housing. I will be using my extra time off this Easter weekend to snag it up and hope that I get lucky with good parts inside. It has a solenoid and gov so at the very least if they work I can can make a little money off it.
Wow almost 2 years later on the money. Well more updates. I’ve been trying to get the snap ring that retains the extension shaft bearing off for 2 years. Sort of lost motivation because of it and figured if the snap ring was that bad the gear is probably no good either. I’ve been busy building a 89 Chevy truck for my daughter but my good friend travels the country for work and he knows what I need. He found a marketplace post of a gentleman selling a lot of flathead parts for a “52” and had some overdrives. well after talking to the man and him heating my situation he decided to separate the lot and sell me what I needed. For only 200 bucks I picked up 1 complete OD transmission and a second complete overdrive. My buddy hauled the stuff back from OH for me and pushed me to get it done for Vintage torque fest. I’m not sure why this car is always down to the wire for vintage torque fest but that’s the theme. over the past few weeks I’ve been taking the LL apart and sorting out what I needed. All the tail extensions were pre 52 so they were the wrong length and one had the earlier foot mount. I had to take the good teams and steal the OD gear and ring gear and mate it to my shaft and use my extension housing. New seals and gaskets and it’s on the floor next to the car ready to go in tonight.
Gettin' after it, good to see. The inside of a transmission is a hostile, unwelcoming place for me, and I've never left there hoping to return again.
We’re in the same boat. I took my time this time though and I’m hoping this one makes it through the year. The parts in the bench are to full rebuild one other and have a totally assembled rebuilt back up ready to go. I want to get back to fun stuff like lowering it and putting dual exhaust on. Transmissions are no fun.
Buy a pair of these and save a lot of time on that type of snap ring. https://www.amazon.com/SPEEDWOX-Tra...=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9zZWFyY2hfdGhlbWF0aWM&th=1
I don’t have a pair like that but it’s on the list. I have a whole collection of snap ring pliers but this ring was stuck on the opposite side so I could just pop it off. That’s why I’m prying it out around so I can get the other side free.
Couple things I want tome toon that I forgot. Mac Vanpelt is a great man. He helped me sort out what parts I needed and what I needed to use to hobble all this together. I’ve got their two books on the overdrive and they were handy to have while I was doing the work. Me and my brother made quick work of the trans last night and she fired right up like never even skipped a beat. I have to get oil tonight and I’ll get here out for a test drive. I noticed they had the Aerostar springs in stock for lowering the front so I went ahead and snagged them. I already have 3” block for the year so I might as well tempt fate and try to add something else to my plate. I figure if I can lower it before the wife gets home tonight she will never even know. My wife like to think that we’re leaving the car stock. I keep trying to tell her that her grandpa wanted it to be a kustom. I find it funny because her grandma hated the “brown ford” and brought up selling it at every holiday. I find great joy in keeping the dynamic alive that my wife’s grandparents had with the car. So if I lower it and she gets mad it’ll just make the whole story better.
There’s info at the 53-59 Ford social group on here about springs. You’re going low enough the Aerostar’s will probably be fine. But there’s spacer available if you need a 1/2” raise or so to navigate driveways. Later model Mustangs something use the on short stiff spring to adjust height. They are the right size to fit the Aerostar’s. I didn’t need that on my bird. Going to be a nice sweet ride and distance cruiser with the o/d working and the lowering.
Cool thing about the r10-11 ODs are the parts interchangeability. Had a busted gm one and got parts from a guy parting out a gm one to build his mopar one. I’ve used stude parts on my ford one.
I’m going to see how it sits in comparison to the stockers and go from there. I have 3” blocks in the rear and it already has air shocks. Plan is to use the air shocks for driving and when I get to the show to let the air out of the shocks. It sits low in the back already from the worn out rear springs.
Yeah luckily the ODs were easy to get ahold of. Now I have 3 of them. The hard part was the difference in the tail extensions and transmissions from shoe box to the 53. Didn’t realize there was so many oddities
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