Qs about dog legs

[LenRobertson]

It might be interesting to check at least 1st gear. I suspect if there is a different ratio set, 1st would be different. I don't think you need to know the ratio to the last decimal place. http://www.gracieland.org/cars/techtalk/gearing2.html

There seems to be enough difference between the different 1st gear ratios, I think you can tell them apart. Maybe go a few turns and divide by the number of turns for more accuracy.

 

I suppose the long-tail dogleg would work in a truck. Are the truck 4-speeds long-tail? I don't know much about trucks, except hanging around this group is making me want one. I know of a sad little 520 or 521 I can probably get cheap, but I'm trying to resist. I have a 4-speed from a 610 that is long tail. I was going to stick it in my 510, until I noticed the length.

 

The dogleg pattern isn't too bad if you are used to it. However, my daily driver is my dogleg '79 SX (until I get the 510 back together). When I have to drive a Hardbody at work with the normal shift pattern, I really have to remember what I'm doing. Many years ago I drove a horse van for a show stable based in Philly. The thing was a re-bodied city bus with a 5-speed. The driver's seat was up beside the engine, and somehow in running the linkage back to the tranny, the shift pattern ended up a mirror image of a normal 5-speed pattern. The lower gears were to the right, and you worked your way back toward you as you went up through the gears. That thing took real concentration to remember which gear you were in and which direction to go to get the gear you wanted. I drove it almost every weekend one summer and only remember getting lost in the shift pattern a couple of times. But every time I shifted, I had to pay attention.

[datsunaholic]

If you want to see a screwy shift pattern, the 5-speed gearboxes in Vietnam-era (and maybe before) Military trucks (Deuce-and-a-half and 5-ton) looked like such:

 

R 2 5

 

1 3 4

 

 

 

Many times, downhill, I'd purposely miss 3rd. Partially because the truck I drove the most had lost ALL it's synchros.

[datsunaholic]

So you're saying mine is not a longtail? I thought it was confirmed as a long tail... It's a 63A out of an 810.

 

I didn't say it wasn't. What I said is it's weird. A FS5W63A is a dogleg transmission- it's also a shorttail- I have 2 of them in my garage right now, and 2 installed in vehicles in my yard. So if you have some oddball, extended length 63A it's the first I've ever heard of. It doesn't LOOK like any longtail I've ever seen. It actually looks like a 63A with an oversize extension housing. But it's entirely possible, since the extension housings are independant of the gearbox code.