SM465 rebuilt with AA kit.

Hello,

I decided this summer to put an SM465 in the Jeep for the granny low gear. I got the Advanced Adapters SM465 to Dana 18kit and a full overhaul kit from Herm (the overdrive guy) and finally finished overhauling the transmission.

One quick question.

I used some wheel bearing grease to hold the input shaft roll pins in place during the final assembly. I read somewhere on the net that the grease will not dissolve and will leave to eventual failure of the tranny ?? The factory service manual made no mention of this. It specifically stated to use "grease".

Do I need to rip this tranny apart again and use special assembly lube or will I be OK running it as is.

For those that are curious about the kit, it's great and the mainshaft replacement is not that difficult. Well worth the money in my opinion.

Thanks in advance.

Extreem

 

I have done it before, no problems, and ran it 15 years

 

I have heard that it's better to use vasoline (or maybe also assembly lube is ok) instead of grease.

In your case I don't think I would be too worried about it - not worth taking it back apart.

Keep in mind that this tranny will have a comparatively light load in your application (probably will never wear out).

 

No worries, IMHO.

 

No need to tear it apart, but I wouldn't make a habit of it. I always use the green Dr Tranny's Assemblee Goo. Better than Vaseline IMHO.

http://www.lubegard.com/~/C-185/Dr.+Tranny+Assemblee+Goo

Most autoparts stores have it.

 

Thanks for all the replies. I'll leave it as is and stop worrying about it. But, I'll be sure not to use grease when I overhaul the D18 soon.

Extreem

 

Yeah, like they said, you should be ok in that application. I definitely would not use grease in the future. I've seen lots of issues with it in the past.

 

I have been using lithium/moly chassie grease to hold needles in-place for at least 40 years and it has never been an issue. The one time I did have to dissassemble a trans after 200 miles (bad syncro hub), there was no trace of it remaining on the mainshaft needles (didn't remove the countershaft). The wheel bearing grease would no doubt take a bit longer to "wash" out, but as is plainly the case when a closed knuckle axle seal fails and allows the diff lube to pass through the knuckle and into the wheel bearings, it will also "dissolve". I would not be losing any sleep over this. If you had used something like a very stiff silicone based grease, it could very well be a problem.

 

It can be an issue. It's not the grease holding the needles in place that is the problem but the grease that gets in the tiny oiling passages in many transmissions that is the problem. Many times it doesn't get washed away as it never gets warm enough to flow. When this happens it actually blocks the passages keeping the parts from getting lubricated. I've seen this many times on transmissions customers have brought to me. I've also torn many down with lubrication "issues" and the grease was still plugging the oiling holes. I've had to literally scrap several of these because the got so hot they welded themselves together.

For my peace of mind I'll always use Vaseline or transmission assembly gel. I use red "Transgel" as it's readily available to me.