Teardown A727 Torqueflite transmission.

[Mlw]

let's get to it...

[RockwoodMike]

COOL!! I just popped some popcorn..

[RockwoodMike]

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/n21vhf6mrjbkv2k5peven/727-transmission.rar?rlkey=j184ywoztodqful6xsmqpzffd&dl=0

I scanned the service manual like the engine and electrical before..

Here is the link to the 727 section from Dropbox..About 30 MB in PDF format

[Mlw]

With the removal of the engine the A727 Torqueflight came free as well. As far as I could tell moving the RB around on the parking lot the RV moved well around the parking lot. I never had the chance to run it through the gears as the RV is not street legal as it is.

But the past two years I've gotten to know the previous idiot absolutely destroys everything he could get his paws too I've decided to remove the Torqueflite for inspection. I was planning to bring the Torqueflight to a shop, but as it's 2023 it's near to impossible to find one here in the Netherlands. Then @RockwoodMike  send me a few videos to show that there really isn't much too it to inspect and rebuild the A727 as long as you worked organized and follow every step carefully. 

Rebuilding the A727 from a rooky point of view.

This video takes you by the hand and take you through every step to make. It shows details you can't find in the professional video. If you've never done it before I recommend this video-series.

Yoshimoshi A727 Torqueflight  rebuild


Rebuilding the A727 Torqueflight from a professional point of view 
This gives you some extra technical info.

And ive added this video's before, but as the are about the A727 it's a nice addition for the people who want to know how to drain the Torqueflight properly

And for the people how to remove the transmission without removing the engine.

Now, as our motorhomes have short tales instead of long tales, you don't need to remove the lock ring they talk about in the video's because it isn't there. so don't try to find it and especially don't try to remove the lockring you see through the hole for the speedometer. I spend two hours to remove it. Yes, sometimes i'm an idiot too 🫣😳🫣



Now the most important reason I wanted to open up the transmission was the glitter I found in the transmission oil. I was pretty worried about that.







When I removed the A-727 from the vehicle I also found that somebody has been in there as the gasket probably was for the 440. 





Then we get at the second point where things are also a little different than in the video's because we have to remove the yoke from the shaft in order to remove the shorttail cover and this bugger can be quite stuck in there so be prepared to use and extended lever handle on your socket wrench and your primal force...





The yoke should then just slide of the shaft. 





Then you need to remove the bolts from the short tale cover. Now, the bearing is pressed in the cover so you need to give the cover a few love taps around so you can free the bearing from the tale shaft and then I got this beautiful view.





I honestly don't know what to think of this, hopefully some Scotch-brite will give some answers if this is baked in assembly goo or something happened with this taleshaft. We come back to this later.



To be continued.

[RockwoodMike]

This is my tail shaft..No bluing and with yours I can't believe it got hot right there ..there is nothing like a bearing or bushing to make it hot..

There is a circlip to hold the bearing in place on the tail housing and I had a hard time getting it out of there..

Munch..Munch,,I need to make another bowl of popcorn..I can tell your write up is going to be a good one!!

[Elandan2]

Your motorhome may have been towed at some point without removing the driveshaft. The tailshaft bearing doesn't get any lubrication if the transmission is not operating.

[Mlw]

@Elandan2

Whoomp There it is!!! and should this have happened when the previous idiot blew up the engine. 🤔🤔🤔


And i'm really at aw at the odds here! I looked at another video of Yoshimoshi where he opened up an exploded short tale.



And here's his tailshaft


For the people who want to see the video

It's a common phenomenon clearly. But with the happenings with the dual axles I was already accepting that it probably should be like this, but after seeing  RockwoodMike's axle...
 I can also remember the rule was that if you pulled a car with automatic transmission from that era the rule was not faster than 35 miles an hour and no longer then 10 minutes.

@RockwoodMike

Make it a jumbo pack... it's going to be a good one    

[RockwoodMike]

I honestly don't know what to think of this, hopefully some Scotch-brite will give some answers if this is baked in assembly goo or something happened with this taleshaft. We come back to this later.

At this point of his video, his output shaft has the same blueing around it..Here is a screen shot of it

I think it is part of the machining process..

[Mlw]

That's what I secretly are hoping. As said I had exactly the same thing going on with the dualy axles. I had quite some headaches about it.

https://www.classicwinnebagos.com/forum/index.php?msg=101019

[Mlw]

and working on it and looking at the pictures the bearing should sit here:

[RockwoodMike]

the bearing should sit here:

Yes..So there is nothing in the blue area that would have made it hot to turn blue..

[RockwoodMike]

When you take out the bearing from the tail housing you will see that the bearing can only go to a certain point on the shaft and stops. And it is no where near the blue area..I used some green scotch brite and it cleaned it to bear metal..

[Mlw]

@RockwoodMike
I will do the same and then we'll see, but my shaft will never be as beautiful as yours...

And here's part two of the teardown. I was hoping to get further in the story, but it is what it is 


We going to get the governor off. You can do these 2 ways. Or you unscrew the four bolts, or you don't and take the governor off as a whole. I first unscrewed the bolts and then took the shaft out by removing the big snap ring at one side and the C-ring on the other side.



And for the people who want the total view of the governor.



And the shaft that comes out


After the shaft and the bolts removed you can take the governor housing off


And the parking gear. just think about it for a second guys, it's just a lever and a gear that keeps your rv in place   

When you removed the bolts, you can pull of the parking gear (or the whole governor when you did not remove the bolts).


Then we get the seal/shaftbearing off by removing the 4 bolts. The  seal/shaftbearing  devide the gearbox from the tale housing:






To be continued

[Eyez Open]

I doubt very much that bluing has effected that shaft,Mic it if your concerned. The heat it would take to change the temper would have been incredible...But those are just my thoughts.

[Elandan2]

Comparing your output shaft to rockwoodmike's, there is that indentation about halfway up the smooth part of the shaft. There may have been some catastrophic failure in the transmissions past. I'm thinking a rear bearing failure and then the shaft was re-used when rebuilt.

[RockwoodMike]

there is that indentation about halfway up the smooth part of the shaft

In the video, it shows an indentation and on MLW's picture it shows the same type of indentation..

Looks to me like it was factory machining that created that..2 different shafts with the same markings..

My shaft is not the same as theirs..My Tail housing is longer..has the same bolt on yolk but longer and different

[Mlw]

yes this I noticed too, that your shaft was longer. Who says size doesn't matter     

I was secretly eyeballing manual light truck gearboxes already. that's actually what I would really want.

On the other hand, these gearboxes are available second hand here in the Netherlands for the price of a rebuild kit. What to do, what to do.

The story will continue. Just have to find the time.

[RockwoodMike]

https://www.coperacingtrans.com/

https://www.youtube.com/@coperacingtrans/videos

This John Cope is a full on racer using the 727..But he knows a lot and explains how things can be up graded to make the transmission better and stronger..

[Mlw]

Yes, I know him from the next video.

I found it very interesting but I don't know if its for a vehicle as heavy as my Betsy.

Next to this, Betsy is not going to be my daily driver and distances to get somewhere in Europe are completely different then in the USA, but I have to admit, a 500 RPM drop is always nice.

@Eyez Open
Thanks for your comment, after seeing several video's I share your opinion, but the way the previous idiot treated poor Betsy is really having me on edge and making me jump to conclusions as I did with the rear axle bearings. at least that experience gave me ease of mind a lot faster this time.



==

[Mlw]

So to let @RockwoodMike his popcorn not to go to waste we'll continue the story.

It's time to get the Valve body out.  so first disconnect the Kick down lever by loosening the bolt on the side.



You can remove the lever by pulling it up


Then you need to remove the E-ring sitting on top of the shift lever






And then you loosen the bolt at the side. You can remove the shift lever by pulling it up.



Then remove the Neutral Safety Switch with a socket.




Now I forgot to take a picture of my valve body, but it's all the same so this is from the YoshiMoshi video. You need to take all the bolts that are circled off. You then can take the valve body out but beware of the parking lever that sticks through the body to the parking gear on the governor.




Anyway, I was amazed how good the inside of the A727 was. It clearly was serviced.



It was uncannily clean inside with almost no friction material at spots as seen in video's were the A727 never was serviced but especially no gear-wear (or glitter) as seen in the oil I took off.
I was planning to just close it up again, but this is the previous idiot we are dealing with, and boy was I glad that I took the whole thing apart.



But this we are going to tell in the next post as why there was no glitter or gear wear in the internals.  For now, have a lovely Christmas eve and Happy Christmas to everybody. Time to get cheesy...

[RockwoodMike]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q0rUmdACGU

I didn't understand what a reverse pattern valvebody was all about..The above video explains it..

Not for me..From what I understand, you must shift it manually..So as I roll up to a traffic signal after being in drive, I have to move the selector to first gear, start rolling and shift it into second,third..

It becomes a manual shift transmission..not automatic in anyway..And then you need a switch on the dash to activate the convertor lockup..So as John in the video stated, you can have lockup in any gear..not just high gear..

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!!

[Eyez Open]

Looking good from here! Opening up these old RV'S can be daunting. After going thru my drive train and suspension last summer with manual tools&jacks I'm still a smidge gun shy. I will repeat one day you will look back and and just laugh..muttering Yep I actually did That!

Then there's curtains...paint..couches..Ohh and coffemakers! 

[Mlw]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q0rUmdACGU

I didn't understand what a reverse pattern valvebody was all about..The above video explains it..

Not for me..From what I understand, you must shift it manually..So as I roll up to a traffic signal after being in drive, I have to move the selector to first gear, start rolling and shift it into second,third..

It becomes a manual shift transmission..not automatic in anyway..And then you need a switch on the dash to activate the convertor lockup..So as John in the video stated, you can have lockup in any gear..not just high gear..

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!!

That's what I though. Not something you want with the shifter on the steering column like me.

If I would go manual then I would go all the way. However I'm not looking forward to rebuild the whole transmission on an rV that i'm going to drive max 5000 miles a year and probably less. If it was for a car with an A727 I would seriously consider it. And that switch on the dash, we'll make it a flip switch     

Looking good from here! Opening up these old RV'S can be daunting. After going thru my drive train and suspension last summer with manual tools&jacks I'm still a smidge gun shy. I will repeat one day you will look back and and just laugh..muttering Yep I actually did That!

Then there's curtains...paint..couches..Ohh and coffemakers! 

A Coffeemaker I have... Or else I wouldn't survive this 😂😂😂

Again, Have a good and Happy christmas

[Mlw]

So christmas 2023 is over. Hope everyone had a good one. I know I did.

To get back to the transmission, I was seriously considering closing everything up again because everything looked so good. I still have something of the motto "don't fix things that don't need fixing" but as this is the previous idiot we are talking about here, I decided to completely disassemble the transmission.

Now as I'm bad in taking pictures I haven't photographed the disassembly of the pump and the forward and reverse clutch, but I used the method of th professional video I posted erlier. The pump and your forward clutch will fall out the bellhousing and you can remove them freely from the shaft. You have to watch the video till 6m:21s

https://youtu.be/nmYAL7i32fA?t=4m27s

Now, I didn't watch the video at the time of disassembly, so I had some difficulty to remove the reverse band, but as the video shows it should be pretty easy.

For future reference I will specify the steps later and photograph them, but for now It's better to go to the disassembly of the clutches and what I found there.


Forward clutch:

The overall look of the forward clutch and its contents was looking reasonable, but that there is wear is obvious.

Front/forward clutch


Pressure plate (other side visible in above picture)


Clutch plate 1.1


Clutch plate 1.2


Steelring 1.1


Steelring 1.2


Clutch plate 2.1


Clutch plate 2.2


Steel ring 2.1


Steel ring 2.2


Clutch plate 3.1


Clutch plate 3.2


Steel ring 3.1


Steel ring 3.2


Clutch plate 4.1


Clutch plate 4.2


Steel ring 4.1


Steel ring 4.2

[RockwoodMike]

You are doing Great with this..It looks like it was slipping with this clutch..I have never done a A727 before so I am in "Deep Research" mode right now..( done 3 Ford C6 and 1 E4OD )

From what I understand, this is the clutch when it is engaged creates 3rd gear..

When you disengage this clutch, and tighten the band that surrounds this drum, it makes second gear..

That is what a reworked valve body will do for you (shift kit)..It increases the pressure to everything to keep things from slipping..slipping is heat..

My clutches were all burned up for 2 reasons..No shift kit and the kickdown linkage was out of adjustment..

Time to find a kit with new steels and clutches..

Munch Munch!!
(in case if anyone is wondering, my favorite popcorn brand is Orville Redenbacher Gourmet Popcorn) 

Would you mind if I ran a parallel thread next to yours since we are building at the same time?