What'd I break on my 54 Ford starter?

Today I was out cruising and swung by my storage shed to check on another car. I turned my Ford off and when I came back, it refused to start. Just a nice spinny starter motor sound. The gear wasn't engaging.

So, I was stuck out in the middle of nowhere and my wife was at work and couldn't come get me. I had some time to kill, so I rifled through my truck and used a line wrench to remove the starter. When I pulled it out away from the flywheel, I noticed some big spring flop off the end and fall down into the bellhousing cover.

So, I'm trying to shop for whatever parts I need to rebuild the starter drive system, and MAC shows this goofy looking thing that only somewhat resembles my starter:


In fact, I HAVE all that stuff. What I need to know is what holds the big spring onto the end?

This is what my starter currently looks like after I pulled it out of the car:



Here's what a complete starter looks like from ebay:




As you can see, there's that big spring. However, I'm looking to figure out what parts broke that caused it to fall off of mine. I don't know if something broke, came unscrewed, or what. I couldn't tell by looking at things.

I just know that the big spring is obviously what causes the gear to mesh with the flywheel and start the car.

Thanks for any help! I'd like to just fix my existing starter if I can.

 

Just get you a new "Bendix " for it and it will be good as new Parts man will know what you are asking for

 

I dug though my library of car stuff and found a diagram of the system. It appears that the spring is actally bolted to the shaft?? I'll have to attack it later when I'm not so busy to see if everything can be salvaged.

Sorry for the ratty pictures. They're from my phone.







It doesn't explain exactly how the bolts hold that spring on, but I hope it'll make sense. In my case, both of those bolts are missing. I think one is (long ago) sheared off into the drive shaft.

 

Bolts should have washers with tabs that are to be bent against bolt head. Bolts and spring are probably in clutch cover. If you don't used the proper washer, it will happen again.

 

The bolts go thru the "eyes" on each end of the spring.......And the keeper washers are a must...

 

Thanks much! I'll dig the parts out of the clutch cover and see what I can make of it all. God bless simplicity.