351cid

XB Fairmont / toploader- Vertical gate shifter / XC disc brake 9"

the problem i have is that when the car is coasting in 1st or 3rd gear with no throttle it will pop out of gear . happens all the time .
only does it when there is no load ( down hills, rolling along at idle ,etc)

it only take me to rest a finger on the shifter to hold it in gear.

its been doing this for years now and is annoying not to mention embarassing when you go to exellerate away and your in neutral.

i was wondering if anybody else has had this problem and fixed it.

i have rebuilt the box with all new bearings and small parts but at the time i could not buy the little locator pauls ( not sure if thats the right name ) and springs that go in the selector shafts.

i have to put a new imput shaft in it one day ( has a bit of a twist ) and it would be nice to fix the other problem at the same time.

P.S. no its not the shifter linkages needing adjustment. they have been checked a hundred times
just thought i would get in first there.

P.S. P.S. the problem was there before the rebuild and the imput shaft has been twisted since

CraigS288

Once upon a time I owned a kingswood with a 308 and a 4 speed (M21) gearbox. Mine kept jumping out of 4th and like you say, it would stay in with light pressure on the lever.
Mostly it would jump out of gear under deceleration.
Internally the selector which should engage and lock 4th gear in, wasn't quite going far enough. In my case it wasn't worth fixing because I had another gearbox.

kelnic

just recently i fixed a mitsubishi van that had a 5spd box in it that was all ways jumping out of 3rd gear.Found the problem to be a double row roller bearing.One of the bearings had collasped and allowed the main output shaft to move back and forward in the box and was throwing it out of 3rd gear.If you rested your hand on the lever you could engage 3rd gear with using the clutch,also while driving in 3rd under load it wouldnt jump out,take your foot of the throttle it would still be in gear but when you apply throttle again it would jump out of gear with a thump but the rest of the gears were fine. all i could suggest is to check the end float on the output shaft is correct

GT 0909

The most common culprits for this is the syncro bars and/or energiser springs. The syncro bars are the three bars that fit in each syncro hub - one hub between 1st and second gear on the mainshaft, and the other between 3rd and 4th gear. The bars have a peg - like a small lump - on the outer face that engages inside notches inside the syncro sliders. These bars are held in positive engagement with the syncro sliders by the energiser springs - look and act a bit like internal circlips, and are located inside the syncro hubs, 2 per hub. If either the springs are weak or broken, the bars won't hold the syncro sliders from dropping out of mesh with the gears. If the peg on the bars themselves are badly worn, same thing.

Sounds a bit confusing, but if you look at an exploded diagram of a Toploader - or any other syncro gearbox for that matter - you will understand the relationship of all these parts.

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BA GT #0909 - Manual, Citric Acid, Stripes, Sunroof, Premium sound, FPV Steering wheel and Mats.

351cid

Thanks GT 0909

thats the kind of ideas that i am after.
i had a feeling that it could be something like that.

do you know if you can still buy these parts.

they didn`t seem to be available when i rebuilt the box but that was several years ago.

GT 0909

Don't know where you can get them now. I haven't had to touch a toploader for years, so I'm down on resources now. Some of the gearbox specialists, like DiffTrans Spares in Brisbane should be able to source them for you though.

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BA GT #0909 - Manual, Citric Acid, Stripes, Sunroof, Premium sound, FPV Steering wheel and Mats.