Ok, TONS of pictures as promised:
Are we ready to rebuild yet? Here's my corner of the garrage with all my tranny guts and lots of new parts in pretty little bags with red Honda stickers on them.
An essential tool when rebuilding a tranny is a bearing puller set. This is my bearing separator tool in action on one of the diff bearings.
Here is the puller part attached to the separator. It can handle 10 tons.
Success. Both bearings removed from the diff.
Pulling the main shaft end bearing.
New main shaft end bearing installed. I didn't have to use a press for this one. This is the only part of the main shaft that I'm dealing with on this rebuild, so it goes to sit in a box for now.
When you first pull out the main shaft, be very careful not to drop, lose, or mix up these two washers that are on the shaft. One is a spring washer and the other is a shim...they're HIGHLY important.
Another essential tool is the seal driver set I bought.
This is the main shaft seal. Note that the way I am holding it is how it goes in...the side with the words on it does NOT see oil.
Seal driver in action on the main shaft seal.
Main shaft seal in place.
Now driving in the main shaft bearing [often referred to as the ISB or input shaft bearing].
Aren't brand new bearings just sexy? ISB in place.
A new pickup magnet. It's a pretty good idea to put one of these in, as your old one will be pretty gunked up.
This is where the new magnet will live.
This is the counter shaft roller bearing. Underneath it is the counter shaft's oil guide plate [white plastic]. I bought a new one for this rebuild, but decided not to install it, as the old one looks fine [no chips, cracks, or deformation].
This is the main shaft shim. It's located in the deep part of the tranny housing. You have to pull it out to get to the main shaft oil guide plate.
Old main shaft oil guide plate. This one was pretty deformed from heat. Peace of mind will come with a new one installed.
New oil guide plate installed and main shaft shim reinstalled.
To replace the shift rod seal, you must remove the two gold bolts in the lower right of the picture.
Underneath one there is a ball and spring. Carefully remove these.
The shift rod is now free to be pulled out.
See how dirty my bell housing is? If I wasn't so lazy, I'd clean it now.
Channel locks encourage the old shift rod seal to come out.
Channel locks = 1; Shift rod seal = 0.
This is where the old shift rod seal went. Don't freak out when you see the black washer under there...it's not part of the seal and is supposed to be there, so don't try to dig it out!
I found it easiest to prop the bell housing up against a wall so that I could have a perfect vertical to drive the new shift rod seal in place.
New shift rod seal in place.
This part of the internal shift linkage fell out when I turned up the housing. Just fish it back into place.
Reinstall the shift rod, then drop the ball into place...
Followed by the spring...
Then the bolt. Re-torque to spec.
Mount the counter shaft in a vise. Be sure to protect the teeth when you mount it. I used some polycarbonate scraps.
Use a BFW [big freakin' wrench] to remove the countershaft nut. A new nut should be used and staked each time.
Another spring washer. Be sure to not put this on upside down when reassembling.
Use the puller to remove the two bearings. The top bearing has a slot in it for the snap ring in the housing.
That's all for now. I'll take pictures when I visit my friend's shop with the 30 ton press
!!!! The diff bearings and the counter shaft bearings must be pressed on, or heated then quickly slid on [I've done it this way, but don't feel comfortable doing it].