Thanks for your help: So, I am replacing the clutch in my 1986 with a 2.9, five-speed Toyo Kogyo. I wanted to ask anybody smarter than me (everybody) for any tips on removing it, and how far to pop in the new one. When I put this engine in, the flywheel was void of a bearing, of course, and off and on I've had a grown. Not sure if I didn't put it in deep enough or if the used tranny had a wobble in the shaft... so, I'd like to do a good job.

Thanks as always in advance.

Tony

 

Not claiming to be smarter than anyone, but I hate to see a post get no replies.
When I did my clutch and M5R1 rebuild I must have put the new bearing in similar to how the one that came out looked. I think the length of the bearing was pretty similar to the thickness of that part of the flywheel. It shouldn’t be too difficult to take a straightedge to the mating surface on the bell housing and measure how far out is the beginning and end of the flat surface the bearing rides on. Then do about the same on the engine and see where that surface will be. The flywheel mates to the crank so you can see where the engine side of the flywheel will be.
My old pilot bearing came out easy but the new one was a challenge. I ended up putting the flywheel in the oven for a couple hours to make it possible to tap in the bearing. Not very hot, maybe 250F. That bearing has a thin case and plastic holding the needles, so you don’t want to pound it in.
A wobbly input shaft means the bearing is getting sloppy, and that results in gears getting worn. Exactly the problem my tranny had.

 

Hey, thanks so much for your reply. Nice work you did. I remember you helped me out before in another issue, and it was a lot of help!

I put this rebuilt long block in about six years ago; the pilot bearing went in the crankshaft and it looks like I made it flush with the end of the crank... pretty darn close. I made the mistake of putting a used transmission in at the time, got six years out of it, but there was an off/on groan from the early days. When I got some screeching noises while running, I expected the throw-out bearing/slave cylinder to be trashed. It wasn't. The pilot bearing, at least as far as putting a flashlight to it, and the old index finger, seems good.

So, I rented a tool from Autozone... the adapter that works with a slide hammer. Don't have a slide hammer that fits, and the tongs that go in barely make it. So... I dunno. Will check out Harbor for a tool, or see if the other Autozone option works. My first time replacing a pilot bearing. I've watched videos about using bread... blows my mind, man. Bread?

Thanks again; I admired your trick about the flywheel...

Tony

 

Hey Tony, You had me worrying for a while that I put mine back together wrong. Then I watched those videos again where people are pounding bread into their crankshaft and realized that sometimes the setup is like mine, more-or-less flat end of the crankshaft and hole in the flywheel not much bigger than the diameter of the end of the input shaft (for the bearing), and sometimes the crank protrudes out in the center and the hole in the flywheel is big enough to go over that protuberance. End result, the pilot bearing is in the same place relative to the input shaft. I'm surprised all 2.9L didn't have the exact same crankshaft design.

I think your placement of the bearing was fine. A little past flush is probably ideal, if it hasn't bottomed-out. Note that the end with the rubber seal inside the pilot bearing should be towards the transmission. If you were getting noises when your foot was off the clutch petal and the motor and input shaft were spinning at the same rpm, it probably wasn't from the pilot bearing.

 

Hey, 89 Longbed, thanks for the confirm on the placement of the bearing, and putting the o-ring toward the tranny side. Did that. I used your trick of placing the pilot-bearing in the freezer for that easy-in, and it worked great. This was my first time doing this in the vehcile, having to remove the flywheel and all that. When I installed the rebuilt engine six years ago, i installed the pilot-bearing out of the vehicle. I think I put the o-ring on the wrong side, but the old bearing looked pretty good. At that time, I put a used tranny in... probably the noise came from that. Dumb, but my budget had tapped. The Harbor Freight pilot bearing tool worked great for this job--the Auto Zone option didn't (jaws too large). I will post a pic after this is all done. Oh, btw, the good tranny I got on Ebay for this job was the same Toyo Kogyo 5-speed, but with a different rear mount. Taken off, it's the same tranny. My Haynes book covers Rangers from 83-93, so maybe the engine stayed the same but the tranny and clutch assembly went in different directions.

One more thing: help such as yours makes a big difference. As my skill-set upgrades, a recent result was fixing a friend's Dodge Caravan. I had never done that repair before either, but the guy has had a lung transplant--he's on dialysis, and his budget doesn't have room for paid rides. So, the great gestures of receiving good advice is poetry down the road for people you, and others, will never meet.

Tony