Gearbox Removal

Most of this task went easily enough, though removing the Wright Off Road matting adds a small amount of extra effort. The floor panels, tunnel cover, prop shafts, hand brake rods, speedo cable and bell housing bolts were al removed as normal, and the Roverdrive was separated to allow space for the gearbox assembly to slide aft. The gearbox mountings were then unbolted from the chassis and an engine crane used to support the weight of the transmission.

Here’s where the trouble began. I had planned to lower the gearbox out of the bottom of the vehicle, removing the demountable military style cross member, to prevent me from needing to remove the seats, hand brake lever and seat base (including dismounting the two fuel valve assemblies). However, Marsland, in their infinite wisdom, had galvanised the chassis with the cross member bolted in place. This means that the bolts are welded in place with zinc, and even if it was possible to remove them, then the cross member would still be stuck to the chassis rails with the galvanising layer. It would take a lot of beating and wedging to spearate the parts, and would result in damage to the surrounding areas. As a consequence, I have had to treat the chassis as a standard civilian type and remove the transmission through the door way after removing the seat base.

I am far from pleased with Marsland – this is the fourth major problem I have encountered with their chassis (previously identified problems are that the tub mounts were massively mis-jigged, the suspension spring bushes would not fit in the dumbirons, and the engine mounts are incorrectly fitted). This particular piece of stupidity has resulted in four hours of extra work in removing and refitting the transmission.

The transmission was eventually removed and carried into the garage for stripping.