Be1 Gearbox Questions

[Slo 283 1 Cars]

I have had trouble getting my car in gear recently and yesterday was close to impossible so had a quick look underneath as a while ago i had the very same problem and it turned out to be most of the gearbox to engine bolts were loose anyway to my horror discovered gearbox oil seeping out fast from the offside speedo drive/driveshaft seal. Ive bought a pair on ebay from neat autos at 2:30pm and they dropped through the letterbox today at 11am well chuffed. So have started working underneath the car and noticed a small gap between the gearbox and block underneath and soon after discovered the bottom bolt at the rear was missing the one at the top rear had fallen out but thankfully was sat on the box still and the top front one was about 10mm hanging out the hole so have replaced them all.

 

Right my boggle is this, the gunk that came out the driveshaft seal was jet black so have drained the lot from the final drive drain plug. The old seals were perfect and i soon realised that because the engine and box had parted it had pulled the offside shaft out of its seal a touch hence the leak. Not really a problem as im replacing almost everything rubber engine wise on it before the s*it weather comes anyway and ive done both sides now. The haynes manual says the box uses 10/40 motor oil pre 1988 wihch mine is and this is what ive used. Now after finishing the job ive read the chapter 13 supplement and it says the box uses 75w/80 gear oil from august 1987 and my car was registered august 16 1987 thanks haynes lol.

 

So, will this be ok? Another boggle is although it says the box takes 2 litres, does this include the final drive oil area too as ive put in over 4 litres and it still didnt dribble back out the filler plug.

 

What do you think guys?

[welshpug 1,621]

You should use 75w80 and only two litres, are the dowels present?

[Slo 283 1 Cars]

Ive never taken it apart and the box hasnt parted enough for me to notice BUT the first time this happened it was the front 2 bolts that had worked loose, all the starter bolts and even the clutch fork release arm bolts were all undone and i only came across it because the starter kept jamming but the box has never twisted so to speak so they are probably present.

[welshpug 1,621]

the bolts tend not to come loose if they are present is my only thought.

[Slo 283 1 Cars]

ahh right well its a bit late to check now but its bound to happen again and next time i will pull the whole lump out and rebuild everything thanks

 

Dont suppose you know if the 2 litres includes the final drive area oil as well do you? Im confused about this because the gearbox drain plug is a lot higher than the final drive plug so i assume this is for driveshaft removals only and to save draining all the oil but in this scenario is this where the 2 litres is needed or should it be topped up till oil dribbles out the drain plug wihch kind of goes with my first post about putting in 4 litres and no dribble.

[welshpug 1,621]

2L is for the whole box.

 

you need to take the oil level plug out, this is accessed from the wheelarch on most cars, or on the front of the main casing on early boxes, with the car on level ground it will have 2 litres when oil starts to dribble out here.

 

You do not find correct oil level by simply filling through the breather which is at the top.

[Ryan 99]

All BE gearboxes use 75W80. The bit about 10W40 only applies to the old XV/XW/XY engines with the gearbox in the sump. It's a mistake in the Haynes manual.

 

You should also only need 2.0 litres of oil.

[Slo 283 1 Cars]

Hmm i forgot about those alloy sump/gearbox combined early engines looks like ive got 4 litres of new 10w40 oil to drain tomorrow then, i filled the oil thru the hole at the front that's just under the reverse switch.

[deathbringer929 49 1 Cars]

check the main website under article gearbox swap. this shows how and where to fill the gearbox.