Practically Classics Forum

since fitting the new starter truck has behaved well except for saturday when i got the impression the starter ring has had it..... is it possible to fit a new one to a dual mass flywheel or do i have to change everything & have a new clutch flywheel etc

i have finally got the certificate of conformity for the bed & tipping gear.. many thanks to the staff at tipmaster

just had the starter motor off & checked the starter ring which needs a vist to the dentist!! is it possible to fit a new ring or is it change the whole flywheel.. ive been looking online & found this...seems cheap as the same thing over here is €300+ without the clutch kit...
any advice is welcome even if its a shoulder to cry on...
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FORD-TRANSIT- ... #vi-ilComp

Do you have a handy local gearbox specialist that you could ask? Over here I would suggest "Mr Clutch" as they have done all sorts of mundane gearbox related jobs for me over the years and have always been thoroughly reasonable and approachable (they are a chain).

I have no idea what a gearbox specialist could do to help in this situation, but changing a ring gear is a doddle DIY. If the engine has an inertia starter, the taper rises from the rear of the block to the bellhousing side, if it's a pre-engaged starter then the flywheel will be larger at the engine end. Use a chisel to get the old ring gear off then put the flywheel in the freezer overnight.
Next day, stick the ring gear in the oven in a further act of kitchen abuse, two hours on Mark 8 should be enough and then, ideally with an assistant so that the parts don't cool down and heat up back to where they were, bring the two together and use tongs to take the new ring up to the flywheel, then bash it to the high end of the flywheel's edge and don't pish around or it'll cool down/heat up and you'll get it stuck half way!

Once the gear is flush with the edge of the flywheel or is butted agin the lip on flywheels that have one (some do, most don't), then you simply put the flywheel back on, making sure to use a fresh tab washer whose tabs you'll ideally turn up or you may find that you'll be back in there a week later tightening and hammering to solve that mysterious new rattle..

Job done and no gearboxes were involved other than by being dropped out of the way during the removal and replacemnet of the flywheel.
As you don't live alone, I also recommend cleaning the oven and the freezer afterwards but if you were single, forget it, extremes of heat and cold kill all known, flywheel-borne germs.

I would suggest heating the ring gear, not the flywheel and put the expanded ring gear on the frozen flywheel. There again, it's a while since I did one!

It may be easier if you drill a hole through the inner "solid bit" of the ring gear at the bottom of the "valley" between two teeth and chisel into the hole. Just don't drill through the flywheel itself! It will be a lot easier than trying to keep the flywheel still while hammering "down" between the teeth as you can lay the flywheel flat on the ground and have something to "push into".

The alternative is to do what a friend did with his tractor - somehow he always managed to stop the engine so that the starter was next to a good bit of the gear. He wouldn't let anyone else stop the engine as it took a bit of moving to get the flywheel turned to that point if there was a loaded trailer behind the tractor (you couldn't get near the front pulley without stripping a lot of stuff first)!

thanks for that chaps.. ive been thinking as im more flat broke than usual (2 months out of work) would it help if i moved the flywheel through 180 degrees???

tractorman wrote:I would suggest heating the ring gear, not the flywheel and put the expanded ring gear on the frozen flywheel. There again, it's a while since I did one.....

That's how I suggested he do it.

Here's what I wrote:...put the flywheel in the freezer overnight.
Next day, stick the ring gear in the oven in a further act of kitchen abuse, two hours on Mark 8 should be enough...

im banned from the kitchen chaps!! fitting bearings when mother in law had another my induced migranes tomorrow as im still skint immoving the flywheel through 180degrees & refittting the the old stuff just for a laugh (i have my brother in law visiting) so cheap labour

Assuming there are six bolts on this, then you'd be better moving the flywheel through pretty much any other angle than 180 degrees. Doing that would still present the worn area to the starter as frequently as it did before, but moving the flywheel by a different multiple of 60 degrees would do the job. If the flywheel hub has four or eight bolts, move it round by 90 degrees.

You bodger!