GVR-4 Car Driven with T-Case + Driveshaft Removed

[Dashnizzle]

I have a 1991 Galant VR-4.

On a road trip my transfer case failed near the Idaho border in the middle of nowhere. The Bearing cap basically blew off due to a lack of lubrication. I had the car towed to a local mechanic's shop until I could return with a flat trailer to tow the rest of the way home. The driveshaft and the transfer case were removed at this point.

The mechanic told me it was ok to load the car on and off the trailer with the t case and driveshaft removed as it would only operate in FWD.

WELL. I have since read on here that you should NOT do this without a VCE or welded CD. Makes Sense.

I'll acknowledge my mistake in allowing this.

Anyways, the car has been driven a total of 100 feet like this. When loading onto the trailer the clutch started to fail to engage and when trying to unload off the trailer the clutch was virtually non-existent. I could release the clutch in gear and the car would not die or go into gear. So I just pushed the car off.

What damage could have been done and what should I look for when i pull the engine and tranny?

Thanks in advance.

Note: I do have another galant transmission but have not checked compatibility at this point.

 

[twicks69]

Nothing would have happened over 100 ft. If you tried to drive it under any sort of load, you would have the viscous coupler freaking out and it would feel like a heavily slipping clutch, which would kill the viscous coupler, OVER TIME and HEAT. Yours sounds like it is still fine, just install another transfer case with matching input sleeve spline count to match your transmission output shaft spline count.

If it has a damaged center diff where the upper pinion gear oiling washer has failed and the upper pinion gear has friction galled itself to the diff cover, that would make things feel like a welded center diff / i.e. handling load without slippage either continuously or intermittently depending on how badly failed it is. At that point though, the only way you can tell this is by opening up the transmission, removing the viscous coupler and looking for overheating / seal separation / viscous fluid staining or goo in the trans, and then remove the 5th gearset, pull the bearing plate, remove the center diff and disassemble the center diff to look for the damage I was talking about. Removing the 8x 14mm bolts and the center diff cover, then removing the upper pinion gear from the cover and inspecting the oiling washer and cover for galling or washer failure / galling of upper pinion gear.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Yes that heavily slipping clutch feeling was felt, however it was such a short amount of time.. I think I’ll take your advice and bolt up a new T-case and see what happens. Thanks Twicks!

 

[twicks69]

No problemo! If you want to be super precautionary, put fresh gear oil in the trans too, but you aren't going to smoke a viscous coupler whatsoever in that short of a period of time, you will just see if there are other issues going on with the trans.

Being in a colder environment, you are fine using a 80w90 or 75w140 gear oil in the tcase for lower power levels. Before installing your replacement tcase, I would suggest removing the side cover and pulling the input sleeve drive gear and inspect the bearings. The inner bearing will wear faster than the other bearings in the case, worth catching it and replacing it now instead of another tcase failure.

 

[Dashnizzle]

You mean peel off the side cover like this right?? Haha, couldn’t help myself.

thanks again for the help!

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[twicks69]

oh man, yeah and that is a 22 spline 1989-1990 style early tcase. Make sure your input sleeve on the new tcase is a 22 spline otherwise you will need to press off the input sleeve from the drive gear and bearings, and swap over to your replacement tcase that looks 1991+.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Ahh, yes that’s a good eye you have. The replacement is just an extra I had laying around and it is in fact a 23 spline vs the 22 that broke. That brings up another question, as I had read that you don’t want to mix and match these cases to the improper transmissions because of gear ratio differences. You’re basically saying to swap the input sleeve from the broken one to the new one to convert it to 22 spline or am I tracking wrong?

 

[twicks69]

Yup that would be the fastest / easiest approach. Otherwise you would have to pull the transmission 5th gear cover, remove the viscous coupler snapring and viscous coupler and detent ball, then slide the output shaft through the bellhousing side, then install a 23 spline output shaft the same way, then reinstall the viscous coupler detent ball, viscous coupler and snap ring, then seal up the case sections. All while trying to keep the RTV bond between the gear cluster case section and the bearing plate so you don't have to remove the 5th gearset to redo that RTV bond.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Is there any situation in which the newer transfer case should not be attached to my transmission? Wrong gear ratio’s etc? I know I can search other posts in here (and i will!) but since I have you here..

 

[twicks69]

Well any 91-96 1.090 (24/22 teeth) ratio gearset will work. Your old one is a 22 spline aluminum front housing 1.090 ratio 1989-1990 tcase. 1990-1991.5 they were cast iron front housing with 22 spline input sleeve, then 1991.6-1996 were cast iron front housing with 23 spline.

The gear ratio changed on 1997-1999 from 1.090 to 1.074 (29/27 teeth). You would need to change the front diff ring gear and matching output pinion shaft to change that. I don't need to get into all the variations of front diff final drives and their associated pinion shafts.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Hey much appreciated. I have what I need now. Thank you very much.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Well any 91-96 1.090 (24/22 teeth) ratio gearset will work. Your old one is a 22 spline aluminum front housing 1.090 ratio 1989-1990 tcase. 1990-1991.5 they were cast iron front housing with 22 spline input sleeve, then 1991.6-1996 were cast iron front housing with 23 spline.

The gear ratio changed on 1997-1999 from 1.090 to 1.074 (29/27 teeth). You would need to change the front diff ring gear and matching output pinion shaft to change that. I don't need to get into all the variations of front diff final drives and their associated pinion shafts.

Twicks I have one more transfer case question for you. I just got around to putting the transfer case back on the car after swapping the drive gear as we mentioned above. I went ahead and filled it with the appropriate gear oil and now I have oil just pouring out of the dust seal guard above the oil seal when its not level.

Yes it is possible I overfilled the case, however I thought this end of the case was a sealed unit. Is it only sealed when the driveshaft yoke is inserted? Just trying to err on the side of caution here.

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[pauleyman]

No it is not sealed. Yiu are correct the driveshaft yoke forms the seal. Open like that fluid leaks out easily and all of it will leak if you tip it up. You're supposed to fill it after you put it in the car.

 

[Dashnizzle]

Thanks for the tip, lesson learned..