Late and Early gearbox mounts

[garyeanderson]

Fred had some questions on the gearbox mount on his 65 S2 and Photos tell the story a lot easier than verbage so here are some that I took this morning.
Fred posted a link to his gearbox mount, one of the previous owners has been creative in making a new bracket to afix a early tailshaft to a late gearbox mount. the link is
http://www.96trees.com/?p=12
Freds Photos





hear are the photos from my parts bin.

Early tailshaft (upside-down) had a pair of threaded holes to accept the fabricated bracket (omega shaped piece with stud).


machined pad shown with two threaded holes from another angle


Late mount on left and early on the right with omega bracket.


Hole spacing difference on the late top, early bottom mounts.


I didn't get out the respective gearbox crossmember brackets as I may not be able to lay my hands on them but Roger Sieling sent along this photo of the late crossmember bracket and you can see the difference between it and the bracket that is in Freds pictures. It's enough to say that they are indeed different. The early brackets have the hole spacing that are different and the late crossmember brackets are reinforced with some extra bracing welded on to prvent cracking.

[Fred Talmadge]

Here are the two parts from my Elan. Notice the studs welded to the crossmember they bolt to the rubber piece that is then attached to the gearbox with that aluminium part. Real problem with this setup is that there is not side resistance, except for the single bolt.

[rgh0]

Your setup is a conversion of the early mount backet and gear box to take the later rubber mount designed for later bracket and gear box

Bolts welded on support cross member to match the wider spacing of the rubber mount holes as no room to redril holes given the cross member different shape from the later version.

Adpater made of gear box to match later rubber mount.

Lack of sideways restraint same as all cars with later mounts and this normally gives no problem. Would only be an issue if the front engine mounts are lisaligned and the engine does not sit parallel with chassis

cheers
Rohan

[seniorchristo]

I have a question on gearbox mounts. I am installing a close ratio transmission into an Elan S3. Can the S3 gearbox crossmember just be redrilled for the narrower c/r mount or are there also differences in height and location?
ThanksChris

[jk952]

Pict. of early mount, hole spacing is 2 7/8 inches, note they came with flanges welded presumably to restrain fore aft rubber movement of the early isolator. Height from the four mount hole flanges to the isolator surface on this one is about 1 7/16, but since outer flanges not flat, likely design was 1 1/2.

Jack

[Fred Talmadge]

That was a blast from the past. What ever worries I had about this mount, 13 years on have long past.

[jk952]

I thought the same till I read the recent question, was nice of Chris to dig up past info however.

[seniorchristo]

Does anyone know?
Are the spacers required between rubber gearbox mount and chassis mount when using an early mount with close ratio transmission?

Thanks
Chris

[jk952]

If you use the early mount with the early rubber bit and hat shaped bracket under the flat trany part, it does not use spacers as the total arrangement is higher than the later Ford oval shaped rubber mount (before spacers). Not sure if that answers your question?
I have the early arrangement on my (early) S2.

Look at Mr. Gary Andersons pictures in a previous post for pict. of early parts I am referring to.

[seniorchristo]

jk

Yes! that answers my question. I did some preliminary measurements and found same but wanted some collaboration.
.

Thanks!
Chris