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Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month! Help

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Andrew1

Senior Member
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Hi Gang!

I have just put in my second 90 degree angle drive (in the past month) into my BJ8 for the speedometer cable, and after 40 miles....poof! No more speedo reading and a half hour to remove the tunnel again to fix the same problem again.

The angle drive has a square compressed wire shaft that fits inside the drive on the overdrive and gets shreaded each time.

Am I doing up the sleave too tight? Anybody had this problem or how to prevent it?

Cheers,

Andrew
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

Hi Andrew,
The angle drive has a short piece of cable with square ends between the drive & the gear. There should be a copper or fiber washer between the drive housing & the transmission housing. If this washer is missing, the short cable will bottom out (be too long) & bind. There is a slight chance that the stub is too long, or It may be that the squared ends of the stub cable are a little too large to fully seat in their respective holes. If needed, the square ends can be dressed down with a file. But I would check for the washer first.

If you had to, the drive can be taken apart by gently driving the pinion out of the housing, which removes the pressed in end plug with it. The plug can later be resealed with epoxy & seated back into the housing. This is sometimes necessary in order to remove a broken stub cable.
D
 
HI Andrew, If the Angle drive itself did not get buggerd up the short wire shaft that fits in side may be obtainable from a volvo dealer. They are used on the P1800 series cars.Alternatively, if there is a speedo repair facility close to you they can make this small cable too---Fwiw---Keoke
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

It's not too hard to swedge the ends of a short length of round cable to square.
D
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

Yeah I know Dave but flaying of the wire ends can be a problem. At the Speedo shops they have a hydraulc press that litterly welds the strands together,then you can cut them to length using a Dremel with a cut off disk as well as champher the ends if required.---Keoke
 
Thank you gentlemen! The problem is fixed. The correct washer is installed, but the last failure was in the speedo cable itself this time. It seemed to be caused by my incorrect positioning of the angle drive when tightening it down. I tightened it in such a way that it was pointing 45 degees upward off the overdrive causing too tight a kink for the cable to make it forward and around the trans and out the tunnel. Oh well, I guess you learn!

Thanks again!

- Andrew -
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

Hi Andrew. I'm a newbie to the list and had a similar problem. The culprit in my case was the bearing in the speedo had seized, thus shearing off the drive cable.
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

[ QUOTE ]

If you had to, the drive can be taken apart by gently driving the pinion out of the housing, which removes the pressed in end plug with it. The plug can later be resealed with epoxy & seated back into the housing. This is sometimes necessary in order to remove a broken stub cable.
D

[/ QUOTE ]
Right On Dave! Thanks for the tip. Recently my speedometer quit working and thought the actual speedometer was at fault. After removing the cable from the rear (under the dash) I drove the car and the cable was not turning. After removing the transmission cover I discovered the pressed in round metal plug and respective drive gear just laying there on the carpet only about an inch from the frame rail. Had it fallen further it surely would have been gone forever, what luck. Replaced all and resealed the plug and all works well. Thanks for the tip. Once again the forum came through.
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

I know the purists won't like this however In the past I have had problems with the angle drive a couple of times and I got tired of removing the trans tunnel (BJ8) to look at it so I cut a hole in the side of the tunne and put an aluminum plate over the hole so I can access the drive easily. Since doing that I have never had a problem with the angle drive. Go figure!!
 
Re: Speedometer Angle Drive -Two Gone this month!

Ron Wilson! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif---Keoke /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 
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