Which hole??!!

Hi, guys.

Yet another controversy arises. As one prepares to attach his clutch cable to the A543 gearbox, he realizes there are two holes in the gearbox case through which the cable might pass. As one peers over the front of the car at the gearbox, the one on his RIGHT (driver's side) is farthest out from the axis of the clutch lever. This would tend to give more leverage to the cable while the lever is low in its travel but it gets cramped at the top. The one on the viewer's left (passenger's side) is more directly in line with the clutch lever as the lever is pulled upward to near the top of its travel. Which one is correct?

Before you answer, bear in mind this: the FACTORY shows BOTH holes being used in its literature with this transmission. FACTORY DRAWINGS show this discrepancy There are TWO types of spacers that use the gearbox holes to direct the clutch cable. One is beveled on top (#4641289) for use of the right-side (driver's side) hole, the other flat on top (#4377825) for use with the left (passenger's side) hole.

What gives!!??

My spacer came from a 94, A523. It utilizes the hole on the drivers side to pass the cable through. The other hole is used to hold the spacer in place and stop it from rotating. There is a "pin" molded into the spacer that goes into the other hole to accomplish this. So to answer your question, both holes. The "shocker" if you will.

Lightbulb010, I have an image I'm trying to send to your private email to explain this, which I'll ask you to post. But I get a message of "...allocated resources exceeded" and I can't send it. It's a smallish image of the two setups, both utilizing both holes, one like yours and one using the other hole for the cable, both factory drawings. I'll keep trying to send it because no one has mentioned this that I can find, in the past. It explains why some guys get away without using the beveled plastic piece.

.......Ray

check your other thread ..

Ditto, Johny, and thanks.

Lightbulb, my image got through. Please post it. Thanks.

........Ray

Attachment 61467
Interesting. My a543 case is from 90' which would mean that it was originally a small spline 3.50 ratio trans. My donor car had a 94' a523 3.77 large spline. I swapped the 3.77 gearset from the 94' into the 90' case. My 90' case has a third hole on the cable mounting tab like the one in the right side of the picture, but the 94' trans used the spacer in the left side of the picture and that's what I'm using. I don't remember if the 94' case had that third hole or not and I don't have it anymore. This has me wondering if I should actually have the other spacer to go with my older case. I know that the release arm was re-clocked on the newer transmissions. Maybe the difference in the spacer corresponds to this change. I hope someone more knowledgeable can shed some light on this because I'm a little lost now.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RayO

What gives!!??

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YEARS, MAKE, MODEL matters!!! Post put that info in every thread you make. I had to look thru your other threads to find out what kind of car you have.

There are DIFFERENT transmission made throughout the years!

This is for a vehicle of 90 model year.
http://www.thelostartof.net/tryingbe/dodge/90.jpg

This is for a vehicle of 93 model year.
http://www.thelostartof.net/tryingbe/dodge/93.jpg

Tryingbe, the make of my car doesn't matter because it never had a manual transmission. I'm putting an A543 into it. It's a 1993 LeBaron LE, but as I say it doesn't matter. The clutch cable can come from the back seat but still arrives at the A543 transmission to go into one of the holes. There is no definitive answer in the Mopar literature (that I've found) as to which of the two holes to use. [But Dr. Johny has the answer...see below.] I have two A543 transmissions, one from a '92 Shadow and the other from a '93 Sundance, as I recall. Both have the flange and clutch arm shown in the image I had lightbulb post. Both, as lightbulb pointed out, have the three holes in the flange. Neither has the look of either of the two images you posted, with the simpler-looking clutch arm.

Thanks for your posting, but the images are really not any help as to which hole is the "correct" one to use for the transmission I have. I'm most likely going to go with the setup on the right-side image. The "spacer" for that is somewhat more readily available, though I have NEVER seen a photo of Spacer #4377825 online, and only a bad one of the beveled spacer that lighbulb uses.. Looking for a decent image for about two hours led me to the conflicting images I had lightbulb post. Both your drawings use the 4295594 ISOLATOR, and neither setup uses the SPACER.

.......R

Correction: It would make a difference in the length of the clutch cable, depending on the vehicle, and that might affect the choice of spacer or no spacer. However, this ought not to make a difference of which hole to use. Am I right here, Tryingbe?

Also, as Dr. Johny pointed out on the other thread "Clutch Cable End," empirical testing gives a good indicattion of which hole ought to be used. He noted: If the retracted clutch arm lines up with one hole more than the other, use that hole.

I noted: The leverage at the beginning of the clutch-arm travel is not as important as avoiding binding when the forces get highest, near the top of the lever's travel.

-ENDIT-