Saturday was lots of fun...and dirty too! It was finally time to install my Graffeo Gearbox, won at Buggy Blast IV in June.
I had Rickey Graffeo work some of his magic and beef up the gearbox a bit.
My instructions to him were; I want to cruise in 4th and kill the ricers at the light without leaving transmission
parts across the intersection. Rickey said, "I can do that."
Here's the specs: 4.12 R/P, 3.78 1st, 2.06 2nd, 1.26 3rd and .89 4th gear.
It has a 10-tooth super diff, steel shift forks and steel cage bearings.
Rickey also added that it has a "couple of Graffeo Gearboxes tricks."
We ran into a couple of small details.
The transmission that came out of the car had the 3 bolt '73~'77 nose cone (right),
while the trans came with the '66~'72 2 bolt nose cone. As far as the transmission goes, they're interchangeable.
As far as the mounts...nope. So after a call to Rickey just to make sure, we swapped the nose cones and went from there.
Ever wonder what it looks like under the nose cone?
While we had the back end apart, it seemed like a good time to replace wheel bearings.
After some tense moments, the inner snap ring didn't want to come out and neither did the old inner bearing,
we succeeded persuading the bearings to let loose. When it came out, it did so in pieces, guess it was time to replace them!
After completing that greasy task, we were finally ready to install the new transmission. Went in like a champ.
The hardest part was getting the trans strap back on!
Bolted the engine up, made sure everything was secure and started her up.
Went through the gears and all looked good.
Put the wheels back on, let the buggy down off the jack stands and called it a day.
Many, many thanks go to David Head for all of the help...and the shop for this install.
