Idler bearing grenaded

[Boyscout]

So last night my Wife said the Mini is leaking oil. I sail in underneath and sure as nuts it is not leaking but pissing oil. Wiped it down and noticed that it was coming from the side of the flywheel housing, not the gasket but oozing out the actual housing. Cleaned it up and noticed a small crack/hole where it was coming from. Puzzled on how a hole would get there, I drained the oil and found this stuck to the drain plug magnet.     

My guess is that it is the idler gear bearing that grenaded. Or the 1st motion shaft needle roller. I don't know which other bearing has those small rollers.

So I guess I will be pulling the engine over the weekend. Hope the damage is localized

[minitim]

That's not a nice sight! Hope you get all sorted and there is no other damage.

[Sean1380]

Had the idler bearing seize on my first GTS, on the gearbox side.

it sheared of the stub shaft on the idler, flung it into the gearbox, which then threw it out the front of the gearbox casing.

[Jared Mk3]

Sorry to hear about that!

[DomMINIque]

Ouch. Holding thumbs that there isn't too much damage.

[Boyscout]

I have a spare gearbox and had a look yesterday. The only bearing that has those small rollers is the inner idler needle roller. It has two rows of those needles. so I will need to find a replacement idler gear as well. I'm sure the current one is fornicated. Then i need to get a replacement flywheel housing as well. seeing as the current one has a crack in it. I have two spares but they are both cracked where the starter mounts. So if anyone has a decent housing or a idler gear they are prepared to part with, please let me know.

[Boyscout]

So this past week I finally had the time and the inclination to tackle the gearbox. I removed the engine on Monday, split the gearbox and engine and then started dissembling the gearbox. 

   

So the damage to the box was quite extensive, the first motion main bearing's cage disintegrated, causing the first motion pilot bearing to follow, and wore a hole in the clutch cover, that's when I picked up the damage as it was leaking oil badly from the housing. The idler was next and the idler's shaft was destroyed as well as the bearing in the case, the case was beyond repair.

I then stripped the spare case and found that the spare case also had a GTS gear-set, but it had a bit of rust. The lay-shaft was in way better condition than my "rebuilt" case. so I cleaned everything up. I had a problem with 2nd gear jumping out on deceleration as well as grinding when gearing back. This turned out to be a bad synchro ring. It had no space when pushed against the cone of the 2nd gear and basically did not work at all.

So I bought the two bearings for the first motion shaft, the single and double rollers, new pilot shaft bearing and the two new idler rollers. Obviously gasket sets etc. I had a few extra baulk (synchro) rings and managed to get 4 good ones out of the lot. I scrapped the box and rebuilt the spare. The spare had a good condition 3.67 diff, the 3.44 diff internals in the current diff had a lot of free play and would probably have failed soon anyway. I transferred the pinion and crown wheel to the "new" case as well. All clearances were now well within spec. Replaced all oil seals as well.

So after about R5k on gearbox spares and some other goodies from Sportscar centre, the box is now very smooth. No grinding sounds, almost switch like shift action. You can gear back to 2nd without any crunching and it doesn't jump out of gear anymore. So along with some other changes to the car, like the radiator which I will post about in the cooling post, it was worth my current bout of spanner rash. Man, I didn't think I had developed such soft "Office - Johnny" hands 

[Jared Mk3]

Glad you got that sorted

[minitim]

Fantastic. Glad your Clubby is mobile again!