Antique & Classic Cars Blog

A wrecking yard transmission often doesn’t come with the shifter. The ‘63 Buick Special T-10 four-speed I scooped up from a Wisconsin yard did. While I have no immediate plans to use it–Hurst, baby, all the way–letting a rare piece like this sit rusted and seized wasn’t right.

So in she went to meet a few shop friends–wire wheel, glass-bead cabinet, hammer & drift, and hand press.

Disassembly was not easy. Even though this gearbox sat inside a wrecking yard warehouse for maybe 30 years, corrosion seized the pins that move the levers and hold the gear stick to the main shaft. It also locked the shaft in place. Nothing budged…. but this is what shops are for.

It took a hot wrench to get the pin out that grabs individual levers. A good penetrating oil soak, hammer and drift coerced the pin holding the gear stick to let go, and the main shaft, with equal oil dousings, finally listened to a large hand-press’ well articulated arguments concerning shearing force and pounds per square inch.

The wire wheel, with a little glass-beading for tight corners, buzzed off all that grungy, scummy, crud, and we were back to the plain metal pieces GM workers put together 45 years ago. These would not have been painted by the factory but they lie unseen once installed–by anyone who might end up with this piece–and I wanted the nice appearance to stick around and rust to stay away.

Assembly awaits another day, though I won’t wait too long or parts might disappear. (We have cats and batting around small objects provides them the same fun that a good game of pool gives us opposable-thumb types.)

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 6th, 2008 at 8:53 am and is filed under Car parts, Car stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.