Roller bearings fell into gearbox

[jgtynan]

Decided to put some different springs and shockers that I got off ebay on my 480. Got some new wishbone bushes to fit while I was at it as the passenger side ones are buggered. Started with passenger front setup, 1 week ago, and im still there .
When I tried to put it back together it wasnt happening. After a lot of pushing and pulling (and lots of angry words), I took the inner cv boot off to find one of the bearings had come apart and dropped 28 little roller bearings into the box. A day later armed with a magnet on a flexi rod i found that there wasnt enough room to get the magnet in..... The next day, armed with a smaller magnet I got 23 rollers out. The other 5 still wont come out. Ive drained the oil but still no luck. Has anyone had this happen to them? How do I go about retreiving them. I dont want to strip the box as its faintly whiney. Im up for replacing it if anyone has one to sell (see parts section). I need my car back!! The mechanic I got my replacement joint from said its happened loads to him too. Shit design is what he said.
Any help would be great, why do I love old cars?
Thx
Greg

[martinholmesuk]

Decided to put some different springs and shockers that I got off ebay on my 480. Got some new wishbone bushes to fit while I was at it as the passenger side ones are buggered. Started with passenger front setup, 1 week ago, and im still there .
When I tried to put it back together it wasnt happening. After a lot of pushing and pulling (and lots of angry words), I took the inner cv boot off to find one of the bearings had come apart

Bit confused mate, So you had problems putting the wishbones back into the subframe brackets?

See http://volvo480.dragons.org.uk/forum/vi ... hp?t=14702 and my comments.

as for the rest i'm not sure. I only done 3 auto boxes.

[Ben Harris]

Yep - had exactly the same thing happen to my 480 when I fitted my lowering springs. At least I know I'm not the only one now! I didn't get as far as removing the inner CV joint, because I didn't realise what I had done until I put it all back together and found the driveshaft wasn't turning centrally (makes for some very interesting steering-wheel wobble at anything above 10MPH!). At this point, I took it to an ex-Volvo dealership - now a Volvo 'specailist' near me, and they fitted a new inner cv joint for me. They too drained the gearbox oil but were unable to get all the little rollers out of the gearbox, and just advised that they didn't think they'd cause any harm, as the gears are much stronger than the little rollers.

Anyway - when I sold the car 18 months, and 20,000 miles later, the gearbox was still going strong, and there wasn't ever any evidence that they had caused a problem being in there. In fact, I'd completely forgotten about it!

Just done a search and found my original post when I did it. Might make interesting reading: http://volvo480.dragons.org.uk/forum/vi ... php?t=3187

Ben

[shimon340]

a friend of mine did this too... lost most of the rollers inside the box. he used a magnet ona flexible cable (kinda looks likea clutch cable) to reach inside and by counting them up he knew when the lot had been removed

[jgtynan]

Sorted it now guys, forgot about this thread lol! I too used a magnet, got most of them out, but 5 still in there and i thought sod it they can stay there.
@ martinholmesuk- The bushes went in fine, the driveshaft wouldnt go back in cos the outer rolller on the joint fell into the cup thingy and stopped the driveshaft from going into the cup properly.
@ ben harris- Thanks, lol, Am I glad to hear that they wont do much damage. I just threw it all back together and couldnt be arsed.

Cheers guys
Greg