Anyone ever lost teeth on flywheel? Just replaced ringgear don't want to do it again.

[SaltH2OHokie]

Howdy,

About 6 months ago (give or take) I had my stock clutch/flywheel replaced with a Southbend Con 0 and southbend flywheel. Not 2 months after that I had a few instances where I thought my starter was going because it wouldn't engage anything, just spin. Typically would do it and if I turned the key back and immediately tried it again, it would catch and start the truck. Checked the torque on the starter mounting bolts, all was fine, so I assumed it wasn't throwing the bendix when that was happening. Finally after a few weeks of that intermittent problem, it failed to start in a Farm Fresh parking lot regardless of turning the key back and trying again. I was thinking starter (remember, this flywheel is only a few months old at this point), so I got a ride to NAPA and bought a new, lifetime warranty, starter. I pulled the old one in the parking lot and for kicks felt the teeth on the ring gear and could feel at least one missing tooth. Cussed because I realized all I needed was a hill or push to bump the engine over a little. Put starter back on, pushed the truck, burped the motor over, fired it off.

Called Southbend and he said it would have had to have been something I did (which I can't argue with) so he sold me a new ring gear, which I didn't realize was replaceable. Lived with the bump-'start' method for a while, and got really good at finding slight inclines to park on so that I could self-help by just clutching it and then popping the clutch back out to burp the motor over to a section of good teeth when I got lucky and hit the bad spot.

Finally 2 weeks ago I pulled the tranny in my garage and replaced that ring gear (both operations were much easier than I had figured, and I again cussed myself for paying someone to do the clutch the first time). Used a punch to knock the old ring gear off and 2 MAPP torches and a friend to heat the new one evenly until it just dropped right on the flywheel. Let it cool, tapped it with the punch to make sure it was evenly seated and reinstalled everything. Also installed new starter at that point to eliminate that as a problem, but the bendix looked fine...ring gear had 2 missing teeth and then 3 more that were damaged beside that. Any thoughts on what might have caused that so that I don't go through this again?

Also, side note: if you have any mechanical inclination at all, a transmission jack, a long extension to reach the upper bellhousing bolts and a torque wrench...please don't pay someone to replace your clutch. It was heavy and fairly time consuming to do on a garage floor, but it was very straightforward.

[Flatbedcowboy]

The flywheel was a brand new one?

This happened to me after I replaced my clutch and didnt get my flywheel turned, which is a totally bad idea. Shifting is impossible. Anyways Seven teeth broke off in a row, about a year after I replaced the clutch, I thought do to the unbalanced flywheel.

Another thought my buddy had was that sometimes when you grind on the starter, and the truck rolls a bit, it can over-speed the ring gear and cause it to stress.

But after only a few months Im not sure why a new ring gear would break

[SaltH2OHokie]

Flywheel was brand new...shipped with the clutch from Southbend. Same flywheel is in it now, just with a different ring gear. One thing my buddy and I both noticed is that the teeth looked different from one ring gear to the other. The new one seemed to have shorter/fatter teeth, while the one I pulled off had a deeper cut.

[ZMANN]

what did southbend say about the differences ?

[SaltH2OHokie]

Originally Posted by ZMANN

what did southbend say about the differences ?

Didn't ask, just put it all back together and prayed it would work. Which it did (so far).