Farmall Regular - Transmission/Axle Removal

I am in the final throws of tearing down a 1929 Farmall Regular that was a real basket case. It leaks at the transmission to differential/rear axle housing interface. I am trying to separate the tranny from the rear end housing. Apparently the rear differentail comes out with the tranny. Consequently, I have to pull the axles. I have removed everything I can think of at eaither end of the axle housing without unbolting anything inside the rear end housing. There are what appear to be bearing housing caps on either side of the ring gear and the bolts that secure them appear to be lock wired in place. Do I neet to remove these caps???

I am trying to minimize what I disassemble since the differential and transmission will only need to be cleaned when I get this apart.

Any help would sure be appreicated. The manual and any other reference material I have has been no help.

Thanks,

Carl G. - Pearland, TX

I had the rear end separated from the transmission on my F20 several years ago. I don't think you have to disassemble anything out of the differential. YOu can separate the whole back end as one unit by unbolting the bolts that attach the differential to the transmission. The main thing is to have the necessary blocking and hoisting equipment to secure everything as you're taking it apart. I believe those are all bolts (not studs) so you'll need to soak them good with PB blaster and then somehow get a wrench on the inside of the differential housing to hold the bold head. BTW,how bad is the leak? I have another F20 that I almost stopped leaking by using JB Quik Weld. This stuff works wonders.

Bruce is right, the pinion does not need to be disassembled. Pull the axle shafts out and unbolt the rear axle from the transmission. You do need to remove the top two castle nuts on the pinion to remove the oil deflector shield. Once the shield is off then you can pull the axle and replace the seal.

Tell us about your use of Quick Weld. I have a similar problem!

I used JB quik weld to seal up a leak between the transmission and diferential housing on my latest F20 project. Transmission should be drained and totally dry inside and outand there should be bare metal for the JB stuff to adhere to. JB Quik weld is an upgraded version of regular JB weld. IT sets up in 4 minutes, so it"s quik, and you have to be equally quik in using it. I was successful in sealing up the whole underside of the transmission/differential joint. The JB quik weld totally cures in 4 hours, and it will take paint. I now have no leaks, except I now see a couple minor ones up higher, about opposite the frame rails. I"m going to try to fix these by filing these areas with a round file and then applying the JB quik with a small dowel rod. Don"t know if I"ll be 100% successful, since the transmission is now full of fluid, but I don"t feel like draining it all out, so I"ll try this approach. I would also recommend that you try to find the heavy viscosity grease 160 or even 180. YOU will further minimize any seepage. I could not find any of this really heavy stuff, so I had to settle for 140 straight weight. Hope this helps.

That photo is the disassembly point I am trying to achieve. I have unbolted everything that holds the transmission to the axle housing. At this point, All I need to do is remove the axles from the axle housing.

This photo is exteremely helpful. Thank you.

As I understand this, all I need to do is remove the two nuts that I have labeled in the marked up copy of your photo included with this post. Correct??

If correct, was it difficult to pull the axles once the nuts were loose? Was very much force required?

Thank you for replying.

(quoted from post at 11:29:15 06/20/09) I had the rear end separated from the transmission on my F20 several years ago. I don't think you have to disassemble anything out of the differential. YOu can separate the whole back end as one unit by unbolting the bolts that attach the differential to the transmission. The main thing is to have the necessary blocking and hoisting equipment to secure everything as you're taking it apart. I believe those are all bolts (not studs) so you'll need to soak them good with PB blaster and then somehow get a wrench on the inside of the differential housing to hold the bold head. BTW,how bad is the leak? I have another F20 that I almost stopped leaking by using JB Quik Weld. This stuff works wonders.

Click to expand...

The leak was not that bad but

1 - I have it this far apart already. Might as well finish the job.
2 - The tractor has been static since sometime in the mid- 1950's. Whatever leaks there are are only to going to get worse once things start moving again.
3 - I really wanted to get good accesss to the inside of the axle housing and to the differential so that I can get everything degreased and inspected. I suspect that the gear oil in the tranny/axle hosuing is the same oil that it left the factory with in 1929. It's like molasses.
4 - We've spent money on NOS sleeves, pistons, rings, and wrist pins. No point in cutting a corner now.
5 - As I mentioned in the original post, this tractor was a real basket case. Any with any sense would have scrapped it. I have three parts tractors now and all three are in much better shape than what I started with but there is a story to THIS ONE. Everything was so ad on this that I really want to pull it all the way down and inspect everything. The JB weld might be a handy option If I develop a leak after it's back together. Thanks for the tip.

I am in pretty god shape with equipment. I have been using a forklift, 6000# jack stands, and two engine hoists to handle this unit.

BTW - I've found that WD-40 is by far the most effective means for cutting this grease. Works much better that carb cleaner, diesel, kerosene or gasoline. I've also used the WD-40 as a pre-cleaner for my hands when I am done. Regular shop hand cleaners di absolutley nothing to remove this 80 year old gear oil.

SproutW,

Any chance I might be able to get a side shot of the tranny/differential? Also, do you have any axle photos. I have no idea what the inboard side of the axles look like.

Thanks,

Carl G.

In order to remove the banjo casting which is the rear axle housing you pull the two counter shafts (the long drive shafts) which are held in by the bearing retainers on the end. Each bearing retainer is held in with three bolts, when you remove the retainers the shaft may or may not come with it. Than you can remove the banjo casting in the manner the others were talking about. I had to take it all apart to replace the banjo casting and the double ball bearings that carry the ring gear.

Like JJ stated you remove the axles from the brake assembly. See the listed photos for more information on the process. They should help make sense of the instructions you've received.
Photos of axle assy.

Thank you both for all of the photos. These are going to be exteremely helpful but they have added a twinge of confusion.

I have everything off of both ends of the axle/banjo housing. The brakes, brake hub/housing/cover, the bull gear. bull gear housing, and the bull gear backing plate are all off of the machine. The tractor is almost totally disassembled. All I want to do is remove the axle/banjo housing from the transmission. To do this, I realize that I must remove the axles. I have removed all of the bolts that hold the transmission and the axle/banjo housing together. I have also removed the four bolts at each end of the housing where the axles exit the housing. I assume that this is some sort or packing/seal retainer.

At this point, the axles do not seem to want to simply slide out which leads me to believe that I must either pull harder or, I need to remove something at the differential. An earlier post indicated that I would need to remove the top castle nut that is lock wired in place on the on the axle bearing retainers (one per side). I am not quite sure why I only have to remove the top ones. Perhaps this will be clear to me when I get back over to work on it next week. Is this all that is left to remove?

I would add photos but the tractor is a half hour away at my warehouse.

Again, thank you all very much for all of the help and for all of the photos.

Yes those four bolts are for holding the packing in place. As for the axles the only thing that holds them are the 3 botls going through the circular plate as shown here in Sprouts photo. But since you have everything else but the shafts and casting off the shafts should just pull out, as there is nothing holding them from within the center by the ring gear. And they should not be all that hard to pull out unless the arent being held level as you pull or something. Do the shafts wobble fairly easily or are they a tight fit into the differential? If so they should just pull out without an enourmous amount of effort.

Thank you everyone for you input. We did get it apart this evening and we are cleaning it up. It turns out that my problem geting the axles out was that they were binding up. I haad already removed all of the bolts between the axle hoyusing and the transmission. All of the weight of the axle housing was on the axles. Once we lifted the axle housing a bit, everything came apart nicely.

Also, thatnks to those of you who pointed out that I needed to remove the top castle nut on each side. I suspect I would have torn that little plate to bits if you folks ahd not made me aware of this.

I'm sure I will be back with more questions. It's now time to clean everything up and start putting it back together.

Thank you everyone for you input. We did get it apart this evening and we are cleaning it up. It turns out that my problem geting the axles out was that they were binding up. I had already removed all of the bolts between the axle housing and the transmission. All of the weight of the axle housing was resting on the axles. Once we lifted the axle housing a bit, everything came apart nicely.

Also, thanks to those of you who pointed out that I needed to remove the top castle nut on each side of the ring gear. I suspect I would have torn that little plate to bits if you folks had not made me aware of this.

I'm sure I will be back with more questions. It's now time to clean everything up and start putting it back together.