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Missing Angle Drive

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Bruce74B

Jedi Knight
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My speedometer quit working a while back and I finally got time to jack her up to check the transmission end angle drive. After squeezing my fat body underneath with a light I noticed that there is NO angle drive there...the cable is screwed straight onto the tranny and makes a hard bend up toward the engine campartment. The speedometer had worked fine hooked up like this...although the cable does hang down pretty low I now so astutely notice.

I don't have time to mess with this now anyhow (due to the fact that there is also a HVAC system waiting in my garage and I need to move the B out when the HVAC guy is ready to tear out the old and put in the new) so I am wondering...
-Will I be able to just unscrew the cable, screw in the angle drive and attach the cable to the drive? Same thread?
-Is is safe to assume that I also need the angle drive on the speedometer end, since something broke...if it is there?
-What is the best way you all have found to R&R that angle drive?
-Do I really care how fast I am going? or do I need to know?

If anyone has any advice and insight, I would appreciate your thoughts on this.

Thanks,

Bruce
 
Where does the cable for the speedo go? If it enters the firewall on the drivers side somewhat in line of the speedo then you don't have a speedo mounted angle drive. I believe some people switch over to the od speedo cable to eliminate the angle drive on the transmission and a previous owner may have done that. The threads should be the same and if you wish to add an angle drive it shouldn't be an issue.

Hot tip if you do have to replace the cable on the speedo end remove the heater/defroster controls. You don't have to undue the control cable for it just pop the knob off and a 5/8th deep socket remove the nut and wiggle out the control from the dash and you will then have more than enough room to work back there and you wont loose as much blood in the process.
 
also try reseting the trip counter to 0 and use a drill to turn the cable counter clockwise if the trip counter doesn't change then you have an issue further up stream broken cable or bad speedo.
 
Thanks Stewart! The cable does go into the firewall directly behind the speedometer...rut roh, I guess it is not the angle drives that had gone bad. I do have OD, so does that mean that there are no angle drives? Gee, that seems too easy to me. I will have to get out the drill and get back under there when I can.

Bruce
 
Make sure to keep the copper washer between the transmission and the cable. Without it you can quickly break a cable.
 
If speedo cable comes in directly behind speedo, no angle drive....however, down at the transmission you probably need one.....there's not alot of room down there.
 
And Molly is lovely.
 
I think I might add an agle drive down at the transmission to move the cable up tighter to the car...it kinda hangs down now pretty far. Tony, I will email you a list...I need a gas sender, hub cap and emblem, too. Might look at some might as wells this weekend and try to figure out why the speedometer suddenly stoped working, since there are no angle drives to quit.

Thanks all for you help!

Bruce
 
Well, I got the new furnace and heat pump installed last week, so this weekend I got back under Dolly to pull the speedometer cable, which was broken at the transmission end. There was no copper washer and the end of the cable is still stuck in the hole...I figure I can get it out when I have a new one to install. Does the oil leak out when the cable is removed?

I think I will install the new cable the same way, sans angle drive...it seems to be easier to get the cable in there without messing with an angle drive and there is plenty of room below the OD unit to make the turn with the cable. While I have it up on jack stands and she is low on gas, I guess I will pull the gas sending unit and see what is with that, then order parts for these and a few other projects.

Thanks for your help, everyone. Especially Stewart, thanks for the tip to pull the heater control...that certainly did make it a lot easier to get up in there and unscrew the cable.

Bruce
 
Jack the passenger side up a little higher than the driver side so the gas flows that way...then, you can look inside your tank to see what shape its in.
 
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