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I do not remember if the speedometer/odometer worked when I bought the truck 9yrs ago. :-) I have a new cable and same gear installed. I installed a C6 and removed the MT that was in it. Is there a quick test I can do to verify the speedo gear?
I’m not sure if you can reach the back of the speedometer in your particular truck, but if you disconnect the cable and simply give the little flange on the end of the speedometer a twist, you should see the needle jerk up a little bit.
If it does not, then there is a problem inside your speedometer.
Using that same tack if you can reach up while you are driving (very carefully!) and feel the end of the speedometer cable, if it is rotating, then your gear and cable or at least partially working.
By “verify your gear”, do you mean know what tooth count you need? Or just verify that it is still intact?
I don’t know what the tooth count should be, but the only way to check it is to pull the cable out and look at it.
With the cable out of the transmission, you can also check the speedometer action with the help of a second person.
One of you can spin the gear on the cable, while the other watches the speedometer.
These are by no means definitive tests, but can get you started in diagnosing where the issue lies.
I was able to unscrew the speedo cable from the back of the speedo/odometer. I also turned the back of speedo/odometer and the needle bounced. I attempted to turn the speedo cable and was unable to. I consider it safe to assume the speedocable is connected to the gear inside the trans. I will attempt your recommendation. I will place a camera near the end of the disconnect speedo cable to watch it spin while driving.
I did not count teeth. Rear end is the same. Tires are not. The speedocable is new and longer than the original. (Pioneer Speedometer Ca-3010) Bolted up on the trans side and connected to the speedo/odometer without issue. I installed the 'white' gear on it from the old MT. I did test to make sure everything spun after grease was installed.
Ford did use two or three (or maybe more?) different driven gear designs over the years. I wonder if your transmission uses one that's different from the previous one?
I don't know what the years/applications were for the different ones. I have only see just the one type that's most common between all the 4wd trucks and Broncos and at least some 2-wd trucks.
Guess that with the wrong gear (tooth count aside) there could be a mismatch that keeps the cable from being driven.
Just went through this bought a pioneer cable from O'Rielly's put it in and it didn't work the transmission end, supposed to be square, was stripped out. Put another one in and so far it's working. There are some threads saying that the foreign made cables, Pioneer is Taiwan, use a metric cable which is supposedly slightly smaller than the original causing this problem.
Ford did use two or three (or maybe more?) different driven gear designs over the years. I wonder if your transmission uses one that's different from the previous one?
I don't know what the years/applications were for the different ones. I have only see just the one type that's most common between all the 4wd trucks and Broncos and at least some 2-wd trucks.
Guess that with the wrong gear (tooth count aside) there could be a mismatch that keeps the cable from being driven.
Paul
I went out and found the recommended gear for my setup w/73 C6. Looks to be the close to the one I have now.
18 tooth (white/tanish) gear. West Coast Cougar says it works on C4/C6/FMX/3sp MT. (Had the 3sp MT)
Just went through this bought a pioneer cable from O'Rielly's put it in and it didn't work the transmission end, supposed to be square, was stripped out. Put another one in and so far it's working. There are some threads saying that the foreign made cables, Pioneer is Taiwan, use a metric cable which is supposedly slightly smaller than the original causing this problem.
Thank you for sharing. I will take a look when I pull it apart again.
I am assuming your speedometer is working but not sure of it's accuracy. First way to check current accuracy would be a GPS. Second would be driving down the freeway at 60 MH. Recording if the odometer showed one mile from mile marker post to mile marker post. If not, do the ratio math. Ford carried, and might still, driven gears from 16 to 21 teeth. Less teeth on the driven gear speeds the speedo up. More teeth drives the speedo less. Each tooth will change the speedo showing 3 to 5 MPH.
Should have added this at start. The truck is a 67 F100 with original odometer. The trans is out of a 1973 F100. I picked up the new cable from Summit. 82in PIO-CA-3010. Thoughts?
Had trouble with reproduction cables, several years ago, when I went from a standard to an auto trans. On and off function, and it turned out to be the new one was slightly different at the flange end where it screws on to the speed-o. It seemed like you could tighten the end, and it work work, but after a while it would get slightly off and would make the needle bounce, and eventually stop working all together.
I finally found a used original cable and replaced the aftermarket one. I took the Ford cable apart and lubed it with some light grease, before I installed it.
So far so good, the last 20 years or so, but I dont drive it much..
As they say... Well there's your problem right there!
It's often something basic, as long as we're willing to bend over and take a look.
Did it leak when driving? Or did you not drive it enough to find out?
Is the gear still inside the trans? Wasn't there a clip to hold it in place? If not you should try to find one. I don't know where they are sold, but am assuming that the usual suspects have them available.
If you don't have one to compare, they're a C-shaped clippy thingy that's stamped with an end flange, rather than being perfectly flat like a standard C-clip might be.
I'm sure there are pictures around somewhere.
So I never installed the gear. In my multitasking of dash/alt gauage/speedocable reinstall I simply plugged in the cable to keep it clean and never gave it a second thought. I picked up a new cable was going to installed it and found that I never installed the gear. I used my remote camera prob and magnet and checked the housing, no gear. Then I went over to my parts box and found the gear and clip sitting in it. Installed the gear and clip. Fired her up and speedometer worked fine. Looks to be pretty accurate as well.
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Installed the gear and clip. Fired her up and speedometer worked fine. Looks to be pretty accurate as well.
