Yes, theoretically you can assemble the clutch shaft to the main shaft with out the
"retainer" it just makes it a lot easier because you don't have to worry about the needles
collapsing when you assemble it. I assembled gears and shafts in transmissions many
times using heavy fiber grease and have often had to take several tries at it before I could
get the shaft started with all the needles in place. You can make the needle bearing
retainer from any light gauge metal strip if yours is missing, it gets pushed back into the
recess in the main shaft when you assemble the two.
Once again, I'm assuming that you mean four of your needle bearing are longer but all
are the same diameter, obviously they have to be the same diameter so it appears that
someone has mixed up the needle bearings from two transmissions.
And again, I’m not sure what spacer you are talking about, the blowup illustrations in the
manuals clearly show all of the parts as they should go together.
The companies that made the bearings that were in the transmission a half century ago
have been sold and sold and sold again. With all the acquisitions that take place some of
the names survive many don’t. Bearing manufacturing was probably one of the first of
our (US) products to be moved off shore and China has been making a lot of our bearings
for several decades if not longer. Some of the original names are around but the
companies are a completely different group of people.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL
