Looking at the greasy side . . .

(click any image to see it in a larger form - hit back button to return)

This shot gives a good look at the fitting of the now shortened and rebalanced tailshaft. You can also see the remade LH exhaust pipes, made to point straight back, to avoid hitting the tranny.

The Automatic Overdrive Box as supplied by Monster Transmissions arrived as an impressive and comprehensive box of kit.

However it did not just bolt in, despite the AOD cross member and mounting hardware. The box just would not go into the hump without a little modification to the floorpan. There was no need for cutting, they just beat it with a hammer (the floor pan that is ) in a few judicious points and it eventually bolted up in place.


The next little issue is with the fitment of the B&M shifter, which necessitated the inversion of the shift lever/linkage.

That was easy enough but caused the LH extractor collector to interfere with the box and the mechanism.

So the pipes were cut and collector removed. A new set of pipes made and repositioned to go back on the extractors, turned away from the AOD. The collector is yet to be put back in place.

Pity the lovely black paint was scratched away from the bottom of the tranny will it was being put up and down.

The ubiquitous Ford 9" differential now graces the rear end! 3.5:1 gearing and the overdrive should see quick starts at traffic lights and low revs on the highway.

With the car up like this I finally got to see why the exhaust banged on something whenever we go over a decent bump with a load or low air in the pump up shocks.
The dumb b@3t@rd$ that fitted the exhaust in Newcastle way back, just mounted it too far back. If they had just made their brackets an inch more forward, it would miss all the undercarriage and never have been a problem.
We had always figured (and blamed) the leaky air shocks for being the issue. I must have spent a small fortune ever the years, paying morons who claim to be trade experts, to do crap work.
Because the thing is, I am quite capable of doing my own shoddy work without expert help!

As you can see the air shocks are history and are replaced with good quality standard shocks from (of all things) a landcruiser! They have lots of travel and are good beefy support for the rear end.