My late mid-life crisis 77 Spider

[Nanonevol]

These are the second gear parts that show wear and will be replaced.
A little scoring from the detent balls but won't be replacedThis looks fine to me
The only bearing Brooklands says to replace everytime is the little input shaft needle pilot bearing. Still deciding on the others but I see nothing wrong with them...

[Nanonevol]

This is First Gear. Anyone who knows think I should replace?

[RRoller123]

Not sure what the cost is, but after all this work, just replace everything?

[AriK]

No way i can help out here but sure following along
Hopefully someone here with more experience can chime in. Keep on truckin!

[Nanonevol]

Thanks! There will be a pièce de résistance surprise at the end. So, anyway, I expected more evidence of damage considering the second gear would not engage at all. Not a lot of excessive grinding noise but just wouldn't go in gear. Maybe that is a lot of damage? As for the cost, I'm at about $700 for what I think are necessary parts. Replacing everything would surely be the cost of new or at least a well rebuilt.

[azruss]

The biggest issue with not going into gear are the shift forks. The pads that ride in the groove get worn and sloppy.

[Nanonevol]

That's good to know! First and second fork is on the right here and there is considerable wear. There is actually a small ridge there that doesn't show that well in the photo.

[Nanonevol]

Back to my friendly neighborhood mechanic with a press to help push off the input shaft bearing.

but he noticed this wear on the shaft so I have another part to order.

Input shaft has 4th gear which fails a lot of people so that helps justify replacing it.

[vandor]

This is First Gear. Anyone who knows think I should replace?

It does show some wear, but should work ok for a while. It really depends on how much you want to spend and how thorough a rebuild you want to do.

[Nanonevol]

So the new parts arrived and I'm putting the main shaft back together. This snap ring is giving me trouble but I've heard it would be a tight fit.
But what's bothering me most is I have to really fiddle around with the sliding sleeves to get them to slide all the way to either side like this:

They seem to stick about here:

or even sooner. The sliding sleeves, synchro rings, and springs are new. It doesn't shift that smoothly back and forth. I seem to remember it was like this with the old parts too before I took it apart and I thought new parts would fix this. I hope someone out there can tell me what might be going on. Maybe it will work better when it's oily.
Edit: Csaba tells me this is normal. If I jiggle things around and spin the shaft a bit, the sleeves will slide all the way to either side engaging the gear. That's a relief.

[Nanonevol]

The rebuild process:
New 27mm bolt banged in so it won't move. Speedo gear taped in place so little ball bearing doesn't fall out.
New "guibo" as we call it.

Woila!

More fun putting back together with new parts than taking apart. Bought a HF 12 ton press ($100) in the process (hate asking for help and sometimes you just have to throw money at your problems) , also a transmission jack (another $100), built my own creeper and got a lot of grease under my fingernails!
Plan was to have my flywheel lightened, balanced, surfaced, but can't seem to get it off! Thought my electric impact wrench was going to knock off anything I encounter, but no. Maybe skip it and touch up the surface myself so I can put my car back together. Hmmmm.
Pasting in this link for my own reference:
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... 7fdW0bDfQg
Same issues I'm having.

[Nanonevol]

Rebuild is complete. From the shop back to the garage. Here I'm still under the delusion I can simply jack it up and slide it forward to bolt in.

I soon realize and remember from posts here that I need to go up at an angle to get the shifter in first then tilt up the front.

The bellhousing barely clears the flywheel tiliting up. Then the challenge is lining up the shaft and pulling forward. Basically steering this greasy 70 pound precision shaft into a precision hole "blindly" since its in the bellhousing and often on your back with your nose in the floorboard. I found I needed more jacks.

Couln't seem to line it up!

And a strap to pull forward.

Basically a two day PITA. From coffee to beer. Fell off the jack a couple times, countless getting under different sides of the car, twisting and muscling the thing to line it up. This is not a job for the faint hearted.
Happy ending though because it's back in with 3 bolts holding it so far but the weekends overs! And I thought I'd have much more accomplished.

[Nanonevol]

This may be controversial. Some may think it a clever idea, some may call it classic car desecration, others may consider it "cheating". Hey, you do your mid life crisis your way, I'll do mine my way. It worked a charm though for the top drivers trans to block and top starter bolt.

I found the spot by drilling a test hole at a point under the car where I could see the socket universal had rubbed when taking the bolts out. Drilled small holes in a circle then enlarged them to make the ragged opening.

Just need to put the driveshaft back in, the exhaust back on, put the interior back together and it'll be time for a test drive. Am I anxious that everything works and shifts well in all gears? Hell yes!

[Nanonevol]

Installed the short shifter and the color matching, "pièce de résistance" It's a real pool ball.

Test drive. Shifts beautiful! My best Jimmy Connors fist-pump.

[courtenay]

Well done - and more particularly, well documented! Thanks!