Hi all,

I have a 84 f350 with a 460/t-18/BW1345 and recently my speedometer stopped working, at first it worked just fine, then suddenly not at all, then i noticed after hitting a pothole it cut back on, but it wasn't really correct.

anyway, after driving around without it for awhile i decided to crawl under my truck and figure out what the issue was. and so i traced the speedometer cable to the transfer case, where, oddly enough it was sitting on top of it, all nice and snug. the gear assembly seems complete, it has some nice clean red grease (or transfer case fluid?) coated on it, and when i found it, it was resting on the slot where it was supposed to go into.

so i tried putting it back in, and it dropped in without any issues, however it is super loose and wouldn't take much for it to come back out, in fact once i pushed it in, i tried it out and it only worked for a second until it popped back out again.

so my questions are:

1) how do i get it to stay in? is there some type of bracket on top?
2) should i replace anything while its out?
3) i see that on the top of the speedometer gear housing there is a O-ring..i'm gonna guess thats what keeps it sealed? i dont see any signs of leakage
4) after i fix this issue, should i put any transfer case fluid in there?

anybody have any ideas?

 

There should be some kind of hold-down clamp for it, similar to what holds in a distributor. I'm guessing that fell off, probably due to its bolt loosening up. You should find a small hole near the opening for the gear that the bolt goes into. You will need to find something similar to hold the gear in place.

The O-ring is the only seal around the gear.

The transfer case should have a fill plug, and you usually fill it until the fluid level reaches the fill hole, and start to dribble out.