1955 Century Torque ball adjustment

[Guest 53 Roady]

Thanks for your thoughtful reply Al. Yes when modern rebuilders see something unfamiliar or requiring special tools they tend to skip steps. There is a sad tail in the Bugle about a guy paying $2500 three times to get his trans right. So it is incumbent upon us to learn torque balls. And Buick often knew best. But they added rubber in 56 and my 57 was not a leaker. So adding the Edwards sourced vulcanized outer retainer ring to my 53 seems a step in the right direction. I don't know if my torque ball and inner retainer are OEM but they cleaned up pretty well. I was concerned that an extremely tight torque ball would tear off the rubber or eat up the steel to steel inner retainer to torque ball. So I shimmed. The .015 gasket plus a 1 notch .012 shim plus a .006 3 notch shim for a total of .033. This is tight but moveable with the club. It's holding oil on the lift. I am resealing the steering pump before a road test.

Pat

[avgwarhawk]

The beauty of it 53 Roady is if it does leak remove a shim/gasket. No need to take the axle out to do it. Although there is no leakage while on the lift, the true test is driving and then letting the car sit. Look for spots forming. This is how I discovered I needed to remove the gasket I had made. You are however going in the right direction for a leak free transmission.

[old-tank]

Like Chris said and what I tried to say in my post, when you bolt the new vulcanized retainer on there is no need for shims, nor for testing with the broom stick. It will be TIGHT, very tight. That is what seals it, the tightness of the torque ball against the vulcanized rubber of the outer retainer. So at this point I'd suggest removing the shims, leaving the gasket and tightening it back down. Worked for my fitty fo, should work for a fitty free.

This is all you need to do. Forget about broom sticks, shims, drag and other adjustment procedures in your 53-54-55 "bible"...refer instead to maybe a 57-58 manual. After the rubber is compressed it will take a 'set' and be just right. After many years and miles when the rubber gets hard and even before a small leak is noticed you will have drivetrain vibration on deceleration from it being to loose. If you strap your Buick on a trailer like I do with straps on the lower A-arms and the rear axle, you will be pulling back on the rubber of the outer torque ball retainer...after releasing there will be a small leak and drivetrain vibration until the rubber recovers. I wish the suppliers of these outer torque ball retainer kits would leave out the stinkin' shims and include instructions for installation like for a 57 or 58 (although 58 I think used O-rings instead of gaskets).

Willie

[Guest patrick david]

On ‎22‎/‎01‎/‎2012 at 11:37 AM, Leif Holmberg said:

This`s how it looks like,and C is very importent if you don`t want it to leak oil

Leif in Sweden.

You are right, I just took it apart and C was not even there. No wonder it was leaking :-)

 

[NC-car-guy]

Following so I remember to look this back up...