I have a 59A motor and took it for it's first drive this weekend. Truck goes like a bat out of hell but at high RPM, you can hear this grinding noise coming from the flywheel, starter area. Like the bendix drive isn't retracting all the way and hitting the flywheel. Anybody ever heard of this? It's very anoying and if you let off the gas, it gors away. As soon as you hit the gas, it comes right back.
Pull the starter and look for metal to metal contact marks. Also something that once happened to me was the weights on the pressure plate was hitting the inside of the trans bell. Pull the little cover on the trans bell and have a look. I'm ***uming you are running a big mouth early ford trans? Some of the earlier cases a 10" clutch would hit. In my case the crank had too much end float.
I was going to suggest crank endplay. If it is, not much you can do w/o a teardown to see if new bearings will help...or worse, a new crank.
Hey guys, can a later 8BA style flywheel go on a 59 A motor? I have this 59 A motor and I can't for the life of me get the starter to stop s****ping it when it's going down the road. Replaced the entire bendix drive and it got worse. Can't hear it at idle but the faster you go the louder it gets, if you let off the trottle, it goes away. Like the bendix is getting ****ed back into the flywheel. It's an old schiefer flywheel and the teeth are starting to get chewed. Figure maybe the flywheel I have is for the wrong flathead. What's the deal?
Have a 4 inch merc crank, schiefer aluminum flywheel. 49 ford truck top loader trans. Feels like the bendix drive is getting hung up at speed?
Unlikely. If your bendix spring is intact, it should retract the bendix away from the ring gear and hold it there. While you are driving, the starter is not turning, so the bendix cannot move along the helical splines to try & engage the ring gear. This means, your ring gear is moving in relation to the stationary bendix. The only real cause of this is excessive crankshaft endplay. Now, I'm not saying that's what your problem is, but if it's bendix/ring gear mesh that's making the noise, that's the most likely culprit. Someone else mentioned the pressure plate weights hitting the inside of the bellhousing. This should be easier to check - pop the inspection cover off the top of the bellhousing & visually check. You should be able to see the finger weights (depending on pressure plate style). You might also be able to feel any ridges on the inside of the bellhousing. Something else I just thought of is your u-joint. My '34 would make a "tinging"/s****ing noise under certain conditions. Turned out to be the U-joint hitting the inside of the cover. I could make the noise go away by putting my heel down on the torque-tube to push it down with the floorboard off. Under acceleration, your torque tube wants to rotate up. If there's enough slop in your system (my shackles were toast & ****** mounts were old), it can move enough to deflect things to where they aren't quite supposed to be. It was a hard noise to diagnose & I only found it by driving with the floorboards out.
I merged your other thread: It is possible to mix-n-match the flywheels resulting in problems with the bendix. Perhaps someone can post the depth of the ring gear from the starter mounting surface for one or the other and you can figure out if you've got it right...
I would need to go home and check iron to be sure, but swapping is not a good idea. I believe the 8BA ring gear is significantly farther forward than the pre-49 one. Note, however, that this is AWAY from the Bendix... My guess would also be endplay; I believe that this swap commonly causes interference at forward face, perhaps with the cover over the oil pump drive gear, and you might be hearing that as crank drifts to its forward limit.
Also...a '49 should have plenty of clutch clearance out to 11" Long at least. I believe that if you lay the flywheel on the floor engine side down. '49-53 ring gear will be almost against the floor, 59 will be significantly up. Pretty sure I remember that in the right direction...
The fact that it comes and goes when you get off or on the throttle tells you than something is deflecting causing the starter to get closer and farther from the ring gear, if the starter gear is hitting. OK , not many things can cause that, except a loose bell housing. As far as I can see. You could try to shim the starter out a 1/16th of an inch and see if that cures it! If the bell housing is not loose that is. Could I be wrong? Sure. Trader Jack
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