Aussie GMC C3500

[Terrick down Under]

Yes, my mum is at Ulladulla, the township is ok but all roads leading anywhere are burnt.

 

[Clinton]

Yeh it's been crazy. Then today we got the rain we wanted, only it came down heavy!!

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[Terrick down Under]

We drove from Belconnen to Royalla thru the middle of the storm. We were lucky to only get 5 dints in the hood.
All the other vehicles at home were luckily under cover.

 

[R422b]

Wow sounds crazy. I am glad youall are all right.
The picture of the burnt trees reminds me of when we got burned out in California back in 2008. The pictures look like they are black and white accept for the people. It is strangely pretty.

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[Clinton]

Hi all, time for an update!

So today was productive, a friend and I (mostly my friend) swapped out the ring and pinion from a 4:11 to 3:73 as the gearing was a little high after the manual gearbox conversion. 100km/h (60m/h) was up around 2200 revs, now its down to 1800, right where I wanted it. Given our highways are often 110km/h it was even higher a lot of the time., up around 2400!!

What we noticed: The existing diff, despite only having 250k km on the clock, was rebuilt at some stage given the tooling marks. It was perfectly meshing, LDS set perfect and in all, great condition. The crush tube was changed for for a solid spacer too.

We re-used the solid spacer, even reused the oil as I only changed that a few thou km ago and was still super clean. I didn't take too many photos given I was covered in oil much of the day. I guess the proof of success comes after time but it was all within tolerances.

Next job: I think I have air in the brakes so I want to check them. I'm also leaking a fair bit of oil from the sump, so I'll rip that off and use sealant rather than the gasket - I know, I should have done that in the first place!

 

[R422b]

Nice good to hear.
I wish I could see it in person. I still have yet to see a 6.5 in person.

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[Clinton]

Tonight after work I began preparing it for removal of the gearbox.

I'll change the engine oil, filter and use sealant instead of a gasket for the oil pan this time. I'm also swapping out the input shaft bearing and fluids, as the fluids have been in there since adding new synchros etc so it's probably time anyway.

I might attempt the harmonic balancer replacement but our dollar has plunged so it may cost too much to order one. If it's not leaking or damaged I'll do it next oil drop.

Also on the list but likely not going to happen this week is adding a leaf to the spring pack. It's on my preferred things to do list, but trumped by the oil leaks unfortunately.

 

[Clinton]

What are updates without photos right? So here they are...

The new input shaft bearing is on, but can't get the cup out of the housing. So what did I do - I just purchased a new housing.

The old one is rough anyway. For those NV4500 buffs out there, there's a bearing that goes over that mainshaft and inside the input shaft, but the one I took out was a little looser than another spare I have. The tighter spare one is a plastic casing and the loose one is a metal casing. It might not make any difference I'm not sure. It's even more obvious when sitting in the input shaft though. I'm thinking that might also be causing the gearbox rattle noises.

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[Supercharged111]

If you're swapping the input, will you have to shim the main shaft to ensure it still has the proper preload?

 

[Clinton]

Thanks Supercharged111. Ive taken the back cover off for a few reasons, one of which is to be able to re-shim once the new input shaft retainer arrives. The other reason...

As I've highlighted in the photo, I managed to put the 5th gear synchro sleeve on backwards last year!!!!
I didn't have a reference to it in my manual and couldn't see it in the photos I had, small mistake but obviously an important one. I was blaming the new synchro carbon ring, but it was the sleeve all along.

I'm hoping spinning it back the way it belongs means I'll no longer crunch 5th and also not have to try 2-3 times to get it into 5th when cold. The next job while I wait for parts is to either nip the oil pan bolts up to stop the leaks, or failing that drop the pan, clean it all up and use a sealant.

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