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Gearbox mystery and anoyance

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70herald

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I started pulling apart a gearbox last to check the syncros and replace the springs which were weak.
Both boxes are 4 syncro 3rail units.
Now this box has almost the same serial # as a second box I have here. RG3001 and RG3344 fairly close serial #s so I thought that they would be almost identical but turns out they are not. 3001 has bushings on the cluster and 3344 has bearing. 3001 has a different diameter sycro ring on 4th speed. 3344 has identical syncros.

Now to get one really good box, I am going to need a few parts from 3001 to complete 3344. I just hope they fit.
Since none of the lists of serial numbers mention an RG 3 rail gearbox, I think these were originally supplied to Autocars of Haifa. Just a bit annoyed. Lousy luck that two gearboxes with such close #'s would have internal differences.
 
Interesting situation! I, too, have not heard of nor found listings on the RG prefix, so your hypothesis certainly is plausible about their origin. As for the differences, though, is it possible that one of those boxes might already have been, er, "reworked" by someone? It's a question you might want to run by the folks at Canley Classics or even John Kipping (who, I suspect, knows at least as much about the small Triumph gearboxes as the folks who designed them originally).
 
The boxes have clearly been apart before in the past, so anything is possible. Canley didn't have a matching syncro ring for the larger type. However that was a Stanpart bit. It also was a direct swap for the input shaft with a normal syncro. The rest of the sycro's were all standard sized.

The second box also matches the parts diagrams for a MKIV spit so I guess that the earlier box may have had some part which were then rationalized out. Fortunately, the gears in the second box appear to be in good shape. The syncro rings also appear to be like new and since they are stanpart bits I will leave them. Now with any luck I haven't lost any of the roller bearings. The only part which really needs replacement is the 1st/2nd selector hub.
 
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