5th gear findings today, I am dreaming it will last right?

[JeepBuilder]

I have owned the truck 3 months. I know some day some where I will finish the up keep and not have a long list of fix it stuff to think about. Well today the list got a little longer. It's an 01 DRW 3500 turbo diesel with the much loved NV4500. I have been having trouble with the clutch lately not disengaging all the way. It was getting tough to go into 1st and reverse had mild grinding with a pretty good lurch once it landed in gear. That told me it was getting a tad bit of drive causing the truck to bump. I know the previous owner. He told me it was a southbend dual disc clutch. And it is I found. Last weekend I changed out the hydraulics and no real improvement. I discovered by viewing Southbends site that I had removed their big 1.75 hydraulic set up. The master was damp around the push rod boot. I noticed the clutch fork was only about a 1/4 inch inside the bell housing window. The guy at SB said it should be 1/2 to 3/4 in. So deciding to go back to a single heavy duty disc clutch, I took everything out today. The trans was low on oil. No idea if it was the correct oil. When I took off the adapter I reached up and grabbed 5th gear. To my dismay it rocked back and forth a very slight amount. Probably somewhere around .050-.060 backlash. I saw the nut had a torx head screw and the nut was slotted. I loosened the set screw and got close to a full turn with the correct nut wrench from Torque King and a 4 foot bar.
I also purchased the 5th gear repair chromoly part that locks the nut using the splines on the shaft. It engages the slotted nut and shaft splines and looks to be the best solution for keeping the nut tight.
The gear is tight now from tightening the nut, but I am fooling myself thinking it will hold right?

I should probably bite the master rebuild kit bullet and get the fully splined shaft and gear and just do the rebuild? I have everything to do it here and have experience with gear boxes, but I am super leary of the imported parts in the kits. The transmission has 164K on it. I would prefer to do the rebuild myself verses sending it out to be done. The original 5th gear nut does not have the slot with a torx head screw right? Someone else put that in?

And I am wondering if Torque King's kits are the same as every other one out there. Their prices are pretty high compared to others like Standard I have used them for NP205 rebuilds but never for the NV4500. Are their parts really better? Or just more expensive? I would like to find the highest quality kit I can. Any suggestions or input?

 

[JeepBuilder]

I believe I have answered all my own questions. Torque King says that is a factory 5th gear nut. After a lot of comparing I ended up ordering TQ's Premium master overhaul kit with the new fully splined shaft and gear. They said that shafts are made in Taiwan and Korea. They sell and prefer the Korean shafts. Then seeing a lot of pretty negative reviews on transmissions shops, I decided to do this myself despite my lack of time. I need to get it done and broken in before a tow in one month.

Then talking to Aaron at Southbend (Peter was off all week) he helped me select a single disc heavy duty organic clutch. I did not want to put back in the dual disc. Given that I already have the 1 3/8ths input shaft, I was able to order from Summit racing a 1947 OK-HD clutch for the NV5600 application based on the input shaft size. It was 825.00 Rated at 425 HP and 900 TQ. Realizing I probably did not need to post up on this issue I have, at least the cross over information on the clutch application for a NV4500 with the bigger input being able to use a NV5600 clutch will help someone later. I guess this is a done deal. IT's Friday.... Have a nice weekend!

 

[BDaugherty]

I think you made a good call on the transmission.
Don’t worry so much about where the parts are made. Even the oem’s have all sorts of foreign made parts. Not long ago I built an ISX Cummins using a genuine Cummins overhaul kit. It had made in china stamped right on top of the pistons.

 

[JeepBuilder]

Glad I did it. I ended up ordering the master kit with new fully splined mainshaft and new 5th gear from Torque King next door in Montana here. I cringed at the price but seeing the kit, I can tell they did the best they could with putting quality parts in. Very high quality bearings and every small part you would need. I am currently waiting on a special puller (mopar 6444 and two specific jaws) to finish it. The front counter shaft bearing and the bearing cup in the front input retainer just cannot be removed without these tools. I have a LOT of tools and I did not have anything that would work. I have a fast cooler and filter kit going on as well as the 5thgearrepair.com locking devise to keep the 5th gear nut tight. While I did not have a lot of extra time to do all this, it beats being on the side of the road later. The trans case and all crossmembers, skid plate, just got painted and sealed yesterday with a quality paint to try and stave off corrosion from our road salt here. The 30 dollar reassembly video from Torque King was worth its weight in gold. The factory manual was hard to follow and it left out the teflon thrust rings for the bearings. No mention of them at all. I have never assembled a transmission with a laptop before. ha.

#ad


I have the heavy duty single disc Southbend clutch here also waiting to go in. I was very disappointed to open the box and find a very sloppy unbranded import bearing for the throw out bearing. I wrote SB and had a short word with Peter explaining how much further ahead he would be to put a quality bearing in and simply charge for it. When I found that sub standard bearing it really took it down a notch for me. Before ordering the clutch I was told by Aaron at SB that they use Aetna bearings. Peter told me in the email that when Aetna is out of stock they use a high quality equivalent that states the number, black seal etc... Not mine, it is unbranded, blue seal, loose on both the bearing and the bore ID is oversize and also sloppy. I have read all the hub bub on these cheap bearings here on TDR from years past and was surprised to see this in my kit given all that. I had already ordered an SKF bearing and turned down Peters offer to replace it. Oddly the SKF bearing that showed up yesterday has Aetna on it. It was 70 dollars shipped. You can see and feel the difference in these two bearings. Pretty disappointing for a 900 dollar clutch that I have to purchase a 70 dollar bearing to try and buy longevity that honestly should be there in the first place. All in the name of the mighty dollar..... I hope Peter got my point on how much further ahead SB would be by putting ALL quality components in the box. Roll eyes....

 

[KATOOM]

Just adding that this product is supposed to be a great addition to preventing the nut and gear from back off. http://fifthgearrepair.com/nv4500repair.html

 

[JeepBuilder]

That is exactly what I have here waiting to go on. Of all the things I read about, the only one that seemed like a for sure thing was that part. I actually had an interesting conversation with the mans son whom invented it at their Colorado shop. He said that their part is made from Chromoly and made to last. That they have had a patent application in that was very expensive and the patent office is stalling and does not want to take it from pending status to a solid patent. The byproduct of that has been a sea of fakes on Ebay and elsewhere. They are cheaper and not made with as high a quality steel. So they wear prematurely. He said that it would not be worth their time to chase down each infringement and till it is an approved patent, there is nothing they can do. So they ended up lowering their price to what they were seeing. They used to sell for 149 and I think I paid 110. I am glad to know that it is an original. Anybody looking for a solid solution, consider the 5th gear repair as it will work for keeping the nut tight. Thanks Katoom for posting that. I hope to be wrapping up my rebuild in a day or two. I am waiting on the puller and a new pivot ball stud. Most of the new clutch is in. Lots of clean new purdy parts.

 

[JeepBuilder]

Just adding that this product is supposed to be a great addition to preventing the nut and gear from back off. http://fifthgearrepair.com/nv4500repair.html

Here is the fifthgearrepair.com part in place. You have to rotate it till the splines and legs line up with the nut. I am pretty confident this never back off.
Again, beware of the inferior knock off's of this part. Make sure it is from the Colorado shop that invented them as they are a better metal.

#ad


And if installing a cooler or filter kit, make sure the transmission lower mounting bolt is in before sealing the cooler on. The bolt won't go in the mounting ear as it is to long. I had to break the seal and put the bolt in and reseal everything. My camera is dying. It is turning everything purple.

#ad


I have a couple hundred miles on the Southbend new clutch and rebuilt transmission. It drives and shifts very well. Reverse was a little stiff going into gear but it is improving each time I drive it. Cluster and mainshaft clearance was set to .002 and .003 thousandths. The Torque King master kit with the fully splined shaft and gear was filled with quality parts. The NV4500 rebuild video was very good from Dan the gear man and I highly recommend it. The new 5th gear was a slip fit on the splines and I don't have a ton of confidence in it. I will try to go easy on it especially towing. I used sleeve retainer on the gear and splines. I really would like a fluidamper as passing past 1800 RPM it has a harmonic resonance that can't be good for anything. Anyway, I thought I would post a picture of the 5th gear part and mention the bolt thing. It is nice to be driving the truck instead of working on it. It's all washed and ready for rain.
Have a good three day weekend!

 

[KATOOM]

Thanks for the update and the pictures... Do let us know how this holds up too. As for the 5th gear fitment, well I understand that there are NO parts available for this transmission which are not hecho en China, and because their metallurgy is horrible those replacement parts are inferior. Not sure but merely stating what I was told by places like Standard Transmission and Blumethal.

 

[JeepBuilder]

The import parts was the main reason I did not want to do a rebuild. Even the shop that sold me the 5th gear nut retainer said don't rebuild it after I mentioned it had 164K on the clock. Unfortunately I found the gear was pretty sloppy with backlash. When I started this thread I was in the middle of about 24 hours of denial. I knew I had to address it. Getting stranded with a bad trans later was a bad movie.
I did have a short conversation with Torque King. I specifically asked about the country of origin on these parts. They stated they thought the fully splined shafts were made in Korea and China. They said they "thought" their shafts came from Korea. He was not really sure. So OK then..... I understand I will probably be doing another rebuild soon enough. Sooner if I scatter 5th gear with to much go pedal. I did notice just a tiny bit of backlash on the new shaft and gear on the full splines. That is only going to wear and get worse later. To bad this is what we get left to work with for aftermarket parts. If they had just made the factory shafts will full splines and a press fit, these transmissions would probably have a better reputation.