164 input shaft (whiny grindy transmissions, not crunchy)

[C M Smith <cmsmith@domain.elided>]

Matthew

According to my shop manual, and the friendly Italian mechanic who replaced 
my input shaft bearing, it is necessary to pretty well strip the gearbox 
because the case has to be removed to get at the bearings and gears which 
are pressed off the shafts.

  BTW, it'll be the dirty end of the transmission you start with, the nice 
clean bit stays face down on the bench most of the time you are doing this 
work!

However, it looks feasible to get to the part where you remove the 
mainshaft from the box and press off the old bearing and press on the new 
one without removing the transmission shaft (mainshaft= input 
shaft,  transmission shaft= output shaft). it should not be necessary to 
remove all of the gears and bearings because the one you want should be 
right at the end of the mainshaft.

  At least one other post suggested the inner end bearing is the one that 
fails but I don't think that can be correct. Anyway, it'll be the one with 
the busted plastic ball carrier which allows the balls to move around 
inducing play in the bearing which allows the shaft to wobble and leads to 
the ticking and grinding noises.

This is cold comfort because the transmission is basically 75% apart at 
this point. The offending bearing is the "rear" bearing which is the ball 
bearing on the shaft at the end of the box furthest from the bell housing. 
Once the rear cover is removed you should be able to see the worn bearing, 
inside the open end of the transmission case. Getting it off the shaft and 
reinstalling the new one with the shaft in the transmission looks impossible.

Another Kiwi claimed to have done it while the box was still in the car?!!? 
To get the mainshaft out you have to remove the transmission case and the 
shafts then are supposed to lift out. Quite a bit of stuff has to come off 
before the shaft can be removed.
Michael Smith
Calgary, Alberta
Canada
91 Alfa 164L, White, original owner

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