What did I do to my gearcase?

[blockeight88]

Hello everyone. I was rebuilding one of my spare transmissions (which I am getting better at) but not quite there yet. Anyway, my goal was to just replace the gear oil. So I took it apart and cleaned out the interior with some brake cleaner. I accidentally pulled the shaft and bottom piece its connected to out of the gearcase. This actually made it really easy to clean in all the nook and crannies. I had to play with it for a minute before it locked back into place. I then realized I could not freely rotate the coupler on gearcase counter clockwise. Decided that maybe the machine would be stronger, so I put everything back together and got this.

 

[DADoES]

 
<blockquote>I accidentally pulled the shaft and bottom piece its connected to out of the gearcase.</blockquote> Shaft = agitator shaft?  What "bottom piece?"  There's a bearing ball (18) and thrust washer (17, metal disc) that go in first beneath the agitator shaft.  Do you have them installed correctly?  They hopefully didn't get lost when you dumped the oil.

 

[blockeight88]

I know you are very technical, so I will do my best to describe this based on your chart. When I pulled the agitator shaft was pulled out, I didn't see 16, 29, 8, 17, and 18, but its very possible they got discarded in the oil. It was brown in color, so it would have been very difficult to see anything. I probably should not have grabbed the entire thing by the agitator shaft without the protective cover on. Now that I think about it, I do think (18) was lost. If so, would it make the noise in the video?

 

[combo52]

Agitator shaft support, washer, and ball

If that ball is missing, it will definitely cause problems, these two parts are two of the very few parts that are the same from a belt drive whirlpool transmission and a direct drive whirlpool transmission.

It’s just one of the many things you learn to be careful of when you rebuild or service a transmission. I’m sure I learned this the hard way many years ago before I rebuilt a couple hundred transmissions, lol.

It’s one of the reasons I often say you’re better off leaving things alone although if you wanna learn, this is the way to do it.

John

 

[DADoES]

 
8, 29, 16 (everything in the "box" indicated by the dashed-lines) come out as part of the agitator shaft assembly.  Separating 29 and 16 from it requires removing clip 8.

17 and 18 are separate parts that fit into the hole in the transmission base in which the end of the agitator shaft sits.  Bearing first, thrust washer on top of it (although not shown in pic 2).  One can reasonably figure that both are there for a reason ...

 

[blockeight88]

So what I think I’ll do is order part 285205 and go from there. Can this be done with the oil or do I have to drain it again?

 

[ddfan92]

When I pulled apart the transmission out of the 86 Kenmore I had, I never found either a disk or a ball in the hole they go into.

My 92 machine had the ball, but I never found a disk that originally went in it. I wonder if perhaps they were indeed both serviced some point in their past life?

 

[ddfan92]

In any case, not having those parts in either of those transmissions never seemed to affect the way they ran. Always ran and sounded totally fine to me.

 

[blockeight88]

^

I’m not sure. The internals of a direct drive transmission is bearing outside my comfort zone. It just seems like the gears somehow managed to lock. If I try to rotate the coupler it will only turn a few times before it gets stuck.

 

[stan]

Weird

That it won’t agitate..like it has broken coupler, but it’s able to spin the tub?

 

[DADoES]

 
Pull the transmission out, open it up, and take photos before and as you proceed with the fix.

The ball goes under the thrust washer, so assuming you have the thrust washer in place it must come out to put in the ball ... which means working through the oil if you don't dump it.  Perhaps a magnetic probe will facilitate the process.

If you removed all the internal gears to facilitate cleaning the interior of the old oil remnants, perhaps something was done wrong on the gear reassembly.  The rack (27 in the diagram) and agitator shaft gear must align in a specific way, are you aware of that?

 

[stan]

Matt

I wonder if u watch a you tube video on neutral drain kit replacement..
It may show you enough to see what may have gone wrong or what parts you are missing, turned wrong way ect

 

[blockeight88]

Replies 10 & 11

Glen,

I will definitely do that, I just don't know when that will be. I'll just drain it and put the new oil somewhere safe. I will get a lot of detailed photos. I do think it's possible the rack (27) maybe isn't aligned, I don't know. We shall see.

Stan,

I have already looked there and unfortunately I couldn't see anything different. Maybe I'll see if I could find a couple different videos.

Thanks

 

[combo52]

Whirlpool Transmission, steel ball and washer

On both the belt drive and direct drive washers, the steel ball and washer under the agitator shaft support the entire weight of the agitator agitator shaft Drive and the entire wash basket.

On a belt drive machine if you leave either of these parts out or if the ball is badly worn, the machine will not spin the direct drive machines will not work properly with either of these parts out. If you think about it, there are very few parts that you can leave out of a machine and still have it work properly. Appliance manufacturers have very good engineers and cost cutters in any part could be left out. It’s probably not gonna be there.

John

 

[blockeight88]

Reply 13

Then I'm confused because per my video, it spins (just with a loud clunk). So perhaps the ball is in tact?

As I described, turning the coupler on the transmission itself doesn't rotate freely, it will lock up about 3/4 of the way going counter clockwise. It's like the gears are locked. Perhaps something isn't aligned correctly, like Glen said. I was just hoping someone could diagnose it based on that sound in the video.

 

[blockeight88]

Inside

Well I opened it back up. Looks like one of the gears had broken off. Probably was shot anyway.

 

[maytag85]

When I rebuilt the transmission on my ‘63 3 years ago, kept track and made a mental note of where everything went, even took a few photos and looked through the archives. Since I put everything back together correctly, not a single problem in the 3 years since the rebuild. Only issue I had was a mysterious clunking sound it would make, turns out he set screw on the transmission pulley was loose causing the clunking sound, thankfully it was just something simple and not a major failure waiting to happen.

Here’s a picture I took before putting the 90 weight gear oil in. Quite a simple transmission, a total of 7 to 9 parts inside the transmission.

 

[DADoES]

 
The broken pieces appear to be part of the connecting rack, and maybe the agitator shaft gear or maybe both are from the rack.  There's no reason either should have been "shot."  You may have misaligned them at your oil change reassembly.  The middle tooth of the agitator shaft gear (indicated by the line on it, Pic 2) must align between the two lines on the rack.

Post a pic of the agitator shaft gear to confirm if it's broken or not.

Have you checked for the bearing ball and thrust bearing?

The connecting gear is NLA, substituted to replacing the entire transmission.  There's a used rack on eBay with the drive gear on which it sits.  I haven't checked if the agitator shaft gear is available.  Agitator shafts (with cam and gear) are available.  But an entire transmission can be had for not much more (or maybe less) than those items together.

 

[blockeight88]

^

This was more so a practice transmission for me. I have a few more but I’m not going to mess them up. In the future I’ll probably just stick to changing the neutral drain components and leave the original gear oil.