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MG MGA - Tip on removing / replacing gearbox speedo drive

G'day gents,

I thought I would pass on an idea I came up with on the weekend which proved to be useful.

I had decided to take my A for a much overdue spin. However when I reversed out of the driveway I noticed a considerable amount of oil on the driveway under the gearbox. Closer inspection revealed the copper washer between the gearbox and the speedo pinion to be the culprit. So under the car I went. 10 minutes later I had the speedo cable disconnected and a rachet on the speedo drive housing. However despite my best efforts at carefully withdrawing the housing, the speedo drive slipped free and came to rest on the inside lip of the gearbox. I was potentially micro-centimetres from a engine + gearbox removal. Thankfully I was lucky enough to withdraw the speedo drive with the use of a carefully positioned magnet, however once out my thoughts turned to how I could avoid this problem occurring again. This is what I did.

With the drive in the housing I pushed a suitably sized piece of flexible clear plastic tubing over the end of the drive. This held the drive in place whilst I screwed the drive housing by hand back into the gearbox. Once all was tight I simply pulled off the tubing and got to work with the ratchet for a final torque down.

I'm sure the same process would work in reverse. That is breaking the seal with the ratchet and then pushing the plastic tubing over the speedo drive before unscrewing the housing by hand. It may be a little awkward but it certainly beats the stress that I went though!

Steve Hill

This thread was discussed on 30/10/2006

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