Father needs pointers dropping the transmission.

[jfboy]

My father is doing the clutch (throw out bearing is toast) on his 2004 termi vert. I now live 1300miles away so I cant help him directly. I wouldnt say he's a mechanic or a gearhead but he's a very handy guy (we did the trans on his 99 F250 FWD together and we even went into the trans to replace a couple things) He's done a transmission in my sisters escort and does all the maintenance on the family cars since I left GA.

He's semi retired with plenty of time on his hands. I think this may take him a while but hell get thru it



Ok...

Basically he told me that there is one manifold nut he cant access by the starter. There's also one of the starter bolts he has a hard time getting to. He also he tells me that the two top trans bolts seem very buried in there.
Basicaly I need some pointers for this job. What's do you guyz remove when you do a a clutch on these?


I thinks he needs to remove(a bitch because of the springs) or loosen(bad idea?) the kmember to get some room to be able to tilt the trans down some. I know it's cramped in the engine bay so I think he may need to buy a few compact swivel socket. But hard to say w/o being there to help him out on this.

Basicaly I need to forward him as many tips as I can get.

He already has a transmission jack.


Any help is apreciated.

 

[stal94gt]

getting the lower bolt off the passenger side manifold is a pain, i would spray it down with some pb blaster to help it out. use a deep well socket and a U-joint with a extention and he should be able to get it. as for the starter i go from the front of the K member with a long extention and a u-joint as well with a 13mm shallow socket. the easy way to drop the trans is to unbolt the 4 bolts that hold the trans to the bell housing and drop the trans down. that will allow for easy access to all the bolts around the bell housing.

 

[85FourEyedGT]

very long extensions, u joint, make sure he removes the trans from the bellhousing first to make life easier , the starter bolts suck but it is doable, hes gonna need to tilt the trans as much as possible to get the top 2 out , other then that tell him to take his time, be safe and if he thinks he cant get a bolt off to take a break, get a drink and come back to it later

 

[Shadow Grey 03]

Both of the above posts take care of anything that I was going to say. The top two tranny bolts are easiest to get when the transmission is lowered slightly and the one nut on the passenger side manifold to h-pipe is a bit of a pain. Tell him to get an off-road pipe and not worry about that nut anymore

 

[P49Y-CY]

i am doing this very same job right now in my garage, and i wish i had a little more time to work on it... so far my car has been up for almost a month!

just throwing this out there - if it only needs a tob (not a clutch), the job is much, much easier, as all he would have to do is remove the trans itself. the starter, mid-pipe and bellhousing can remain intact if only doing a tob.

as stal94 has said the key to get the top trans-to-bell bolts is to tilt the bottom down by removing those 4 crossmember bolts. then a very long and pretty much straight extension from the rear of the trans.

the top starter bolt is tough but long extensions through the motor mount-k member area and patience will get it.

i did not remove the mid-pipe until the trans was out of the way, and on an 04 you can even remove the bellhousing with the mid pipe intact, that made it alot easier for me to get to those exhaust bolts with the bellhousing gone

as far as the bellhousing i had a real real tough time with one of the top bolts and had to soak it for a few days, still needed alot of torque to break it. he will need something to hold the flywheel to remove the 8 flywheel bolts.

so far i have it all apart and am waiting on a new flywheel. i just took some pics i will try to post em

tell him best of luck with it - not really too difficult for a dyi at all! :beer:

edit: one other thing i forgot to mention is to remove the shifter itself. the first time i did it without removing the stock shifter, and although it does clear the tunnel, removing it and covering it with duct tape or something really makes it alot easier to drop and install.

 

[jfboy]

Thank you guyz for the response. With the help from these tips my father completed the job and his car is running great!