VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1929-1932 Clutch Housing Alignment

Am about to remove clutch and flywheel from my '31 Coach and plan to remove the clutch/bell housing after that. Looking for some guidance as the shop manuals I am using warn that if the housing is removed it is critical to make sure it aligns with the crankshaft flange when it it re-installed. One manual shows a drawing of a dial gauge being used to check alignment but gives no info as to what is being checked exactly. I understand that crank, clutch and tranny all need to be in a straight line but don't believe there is any adjustment to the housing that can be made. Am I correct? The housing is bolted to the block and I would expect there to be alignment pins as well that force it to be correctly located. Thank for your help. Tom - VCCA #5898

Hello Tom Fowler,
I agree with your thinking about no adjustments can be made to the clutch/bell housing. What I believe the manual is referring to is about the crankshaft to tranny input shaft alignment after the engine's main bearings have been worked on. Any misalignment (out of tolerance run-out) between the crankshaft center and the clutch housing's tranny pilot hole, would need to be corrected by re-shimming the engine's main bearings, if I'm reading this correctly. Hopefully we'll find out from the experts about this one.

That makes sense Harry. Many thanks for your input!