The guy I bought the car from help me put the advance on, getting ready to replace the distributor cap and rotor button and should be good to go, also I was fortunate enough to win the vacum advance that was on ebay so I'll have a spare.

My diaphram wasn't bad but it was like the linkage would hang up, I appreciate your help.

Claim to fame is the car was used as an extra in the movie Diner with Micky Rourke, Steve Gootenburg, Paul Riser and Kevin Bacon.

Hello MG.Did you get your distributor all fixed up?

  

As Mark stated I had the very same thing happen to me, just bought another one and installed it very carefully and haven't had a problem since.

I tried mirrors, wires and even jacked the car up as high as I could and still didn't find the gear so trying to find it isn't worth the hassle.

I talked to a guy on line that taught maintenance classes for Ford Motor Co. in the 50's and 60's to the dealers mechanics and his offical stance was to totally remove the transmission, take it apart and retrieve the gear, that's a dealers perspective, he said personally he had the same thing hapeen to his car and he just replaced the gear. 

Claim to fame is the car was used as an extra in the movie Diner with Micky Rourke, Steve Gootenburg, Paul Riser and Kevin Bacon.

I have try fishing around with a wire also try using a small mirror can't see or feel a thing Im think about just leave it /if it gets ground up the filter should keep all the small parts out of the valve body

Jeff-At least 57 had a clip to hold it on.Prior to 57 the gear just sits on the end of the cable and fits into a hole in the tailshaft once you get it in place.Problem is the gear falls off if you are not real careful.

  

I had the same problem with my '57 Ford. The cable was too long and the gear was under pressure and popped off.

I was able to retrieve it with one of those four finger grabber devices, where you push in on the end and the fingers extend.

I was finally successful through the speedometer hole but I also removed the inspection cover on the other side of the tail shaft as a place to try and grab the gear.

Jeff Petersen

This is a fairly common problem.If you cant fish it out with a piece of wire you may as well leave it there and replace it.I have heard mention of finding more than one when taking a Fordo apart.MG Cook had the same thing happen to him awhile ago.I put a little grease on the end of the cable to kind of "stick" the gear in place to install cable.Anyone else have any tips?

  

when I was pulling my old gear out to replace it It got away from me and is now someplace inside tailshalf housing/any ideals on now to get it out with

out tearing tailshaft  housing off? this is on a 55 fordmatic what happens if I just leave it in there it is all plastic? How hard is it to pull tailshaft off?

this has not been a good day