Re: Quaiffe Helical Gear set for 4 speed
Posted: Wed Apr 17, 2019 1:13 pm
ceejay wrote:While I am in the process of rebuilding my twin cam engine, the gear box is just sitting there, so I thought that it might be of help to someone if I took the cover off the box and took a shot of the internal helical gears, this is the bullet box, very tall first gear, close ratio gears... this gear box is a delight on the road, or up in the aussie alps in the summer, I run a 3.55 diff ratio, and while it does make first gear very tall and takes a bit of gentle clutch feathering to get it off the line, to me it is the perfect elan gear box.
And runs very quiet.
Shot is taken between the shifter rails, and the angle of the gear teeth are quite evident, If I ever required replacements, I would certainly look to the same gear design.
I don't know the early history of the gear box, whether it was built from parts obtained from the UK, (This would have been in the 1970s) Or if the likes of local Aussie gearbox manufacturer's, Peter Holinger or perhaps others machined/supplied the bits.
There are several engineering places around who would be capable of the CNC machining process, but at what cost I would not know, its a fact that gearbox parts are not cheap, but it is, what it is, I guess.
You can get anything made at a price. i currently have a large ( it weighs around 3 tonnes) industrial gear box under repair. The quote for cutting 2 new gears plus a rebuild of the box is around A$150k the cost for a complete new gear box is around A$250k . The box failed because of poor assembly and to much shaft end float the last time it was rebuilt at another re-builder. Still trying to decide the best option as we also have a spare gearbox of another make and to adapt the drive to use this spare is less than either option around the current gearbox. Its just like an Elan except on a larger scale in both weight an $.
Also don't get me into a debate as to the oil and oil cooling that should be used in these boxes
cheers
Rohan