53mm uber deep well socket DIY

Further to the previous gearbox post, I now need to remove the input shaft sleeve. However this is a monster 53mm socket which needs to be ~250mm deep. Unheard of. A special Ford Workshop Tool "LDV 125" is needed. However I don't have the connections or money to play games with proprietary stuff that flies in the face of "right to repair". (Many, but not all tools cannot be obtained without becoming a certified repairer/distributor etc)

...so off to the workshop I go to make my own...again...

I don't have an LDV 125 tool, and neither does anyone else on planet Gizmologist.

While there are a variety of tools which could grip this piece, the bell-housing prevents clearance for most of these. (chain-grip vice grips etc...)

Couldn't find my dividers, so I cut the end off of an old plastic vernier caliper to get the required measurement. Naturally the dividers were located later...

R.I.P cheap tool.

A 52.5 mm Hex (12 side) plan was drawn with sketchup, and cut out on paper to test the fitting.

It's actually only a 46mm socket, but the geometry of a hexagon can be defined by its radius/diameter, which in this case was 52.5mm.

It was a wee-tad snug, so I switched to 53mm instead.

I hogged out most of the material from my DIY socket with a holesaw. Aluminium is pretty easy to work with, though I did have a piece of steel on hand ready to make this part if required.

I'm going to use a piece of scrap 80x80mm profile from work to use as the "depth" of this monster socket.

I hogged out as much as I could of the teeth from the socket with a 4-flute-end-mill...in the mill.

And then it's time to finish the job with needle files. This part actually took me TWO FULL HOURS to complete...infinite test fittings and tiny tweaks required for so many contacting edges. It would have been much easier had it been a goofy french curve .

Eventually I got a primo' fit.

The 80x80mm profile I'm going to use doesn't actually fit over this final collar diameter, so I'm going to have to make some spacers and adapters to get this all to work.

Three plates go to together like "this" to transition from the profile to my socket head.

...there's still some work remaining to get them all bolted together...

One plate.

Two plates.

Three plates.

Add a breaker bar made with some more scrap profile.

Viola. Work complete. Cya round LDV 125...

Quest for a 30mm deep 1/2" drive socket...

I'm pulling the gearbox out of the van to address some whine noise I'm not happy with. I'm hoping/assuming it's just worn bearings on the layshaft, and nothing more complicated. The noise only exists in gears that I know are driven on the layshaft, so there's a solid hint right there.

Getting the thing out was more complicated than the regular car (north/south) routine. Being a van, the steering placement is right in the way of the gearbox, and an entire subframe which supports the front suspension/steering wishbone arms prevents the gearbox coming out. The subframe had to be dropped down ~100mm to shuffle the gearbox out. Fortunately it didn't need to be removed completely. It's currently partially hanging on the front shocks, and partially resting on some blocks under the van. This meant I could leave brake lines, tie-rods, and gobs of other stuff intact without epic disassembly. The steering alignment is going to be a mess when I get it all back together. This subframe has no serious locating pins, and I'm sure I saw the locating holes for the bolts were actually slotted... :(

Gearbox out...steering subframe spans the lower edge of the image.. Previous mechanics didn't reinstall the strapping which holds the soundproofing against the body...

Clean up req'd.

That's just an oil line, not a crack in the bell casing.

I need to remove a massive 12-sided 30mm flange nut from the rear of the box to remove the driveshaft coupling. Deep-well socket required. Note: has to be a 12 sided socket, not a heavy duty or impact socket which are always pure hex. I went to FIVE stores to get this socket. Everyone says they stock them in-store on their websites, but the reality in Australia is that you can have all three or four choices of items on the shelf any time you want, and the rest is special-order.

...however the standard depth for a 1/2" drive socket isn't that deep, and to make things worse..

...the rotor shaft is 16mm which is larger than the hole diameter in the base of the socket...

So Ima' fix all the things as usual. It's possible a 3/4" drive socket would do all-the-things here, however I don't own any 3/4" tools, so I'm not going to start buying any now.

ps: the workshop manual says to use a special tool for this task...so modifying a regular tool isn't particularly odd...

You can see here I milled out a 16mm hole for the driveshaft, about ~7mm deep into the base of the socket. This should give me the extra reach AND clearance I need to get the socket where it needs to be.

I didn't break through into the 1/2" drive section of the socket, so you can't even tell it's modified.

And then with a little extra home-made leverage...

...I got the sucker off. (200nM installation spec) Stupid one-use flange nuts. (you're supposed to throw them away) I'll definitely be re-using this one with some thread-lock. This could easily have been a standard nyloc nut, the shallow nut was not necessary.

Then the driveshaft coupling came off no problem with a gear puller. That was so easy!!

So now all I need is the mother of all deep well sockets for this sucker!! I smell an afternoon of tool making in my immediate future...

Christmas 2018 Kitty!