Some more details on this build. I always have some reservations when I get a transmission sent to me in parts, and that has been previously rebuilt. I noted on disassembly that the gears and spacers were not in correct place. I now know why. Come with me on a tour.....
This is the set of gears that came with the transmission I laid out all of them with their partner gears. You have a drive gear and a driven gear. They are a matched set and have to be changed together. However, I seemed to have acquired another 3rd gear for a set of 3!?
Click to view attachment Ok, that makes 3rd gear set suspect. Like, how do I know which pair is a pair? Many of us have been to THOSE kinds of parties
One way to tell is to look at the gear coloring. No kidding, many will age/corrode differently. Check out this group of most of the gears from this trans and you can see the blackened gear stands out from the non-blackened.
Click to view attachment This can often help if you need so match gears in a pinch. However, I have trust issues and this transmission is not helping them. The gears with the orange arrows are darker and crusty compared to the rest of the gears. The problem? Well, one is a 4th gear, the other part of the 4th gear looks fine (and not its original match) and the other gear in question is the extra 3rd gear. WTF??!
So, in my opinion, I have at least two incorrectly matched sets, or one incorrectly matched set and one extra gear from somewhere.
The crappy looking gears are worn as well. Honestly, this is common of tail shifter transmissions and why I pay low prices for them as cores as I tend to have to toss most of the parts due to wear from neglect and age. Arrows annotated worn patterns on gear faces.
Click to view attachment Click to view attachment Click to view attachmentThese are examples of good gears from same trans.
Click to view attachment Click to view attachmentClick to view attachmentSo, what I recommended was if we cannot verify that the gears are matches sets, we need to put matches sets in. Not to expensive for stock 914 gears. Fun fact, this is a 914 specific dilemma as the 911/912 gears are all hand numbered sets so you can check the numbers to verify.