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A clutch shaft, which carries the friction plate on 21 splines is supported at its front end by a ball type spigot bearing in the crankshaft, and is connected at its rear end by a roller bearing at the front, and a double ball bearing at the rear, whereas the secondary shaft uses a roller bearing at the front and a dual taper roller bearing at the rear. Needle roller bearings are used on each of the 'free' pinions.

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Short splined shafts, integral with the differential sun gears, project through each side of the casing where they carry the inboard C.V. joints of the drive shafts. The crown wheel/differential carrier assembly is supported by taper roller bearings which are adjustable for pre-load. Final drive pinion depth is controlled by gearset matching and is not adjustable, but crown wheel and pinion backlash is set using shim washers.

On cars using a mechanically driven speedometer, the speedometer drive gear is mounted onto the differential carrier and mates with a driven pinion located in the right hand side of the casing. Sport 300 models using  the Lotus Compact Differential, and all cars 95MY and newer, use an electronic speedometer which receives signals from a sensor mounted on the right hand rear hub carrier assembly in conjunction with a toothed ring on the driveshaft. This data is also used by the engine management system. A blanking plug is fitted in the transmission casing in place of the speedometer driven gear.

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The cross shaft projects from the left hand side of the gearbox rear housing, and is fitted with a swivel 'tree' device to which the two gearchange cables are connected. These two push-pull cables are used to transfer movement from the gearchange lever to the swivel tree, which translates the motion into rotational and axial movement of the cross shaft.

The second gear selector fork is operated by it's selector shaft via a compression spring, which ensures a rapid (delayed) action of the synchronizer mechanism regardless of gearlever movement speed for optimum synchronizing action when engaging 2nd gear.

The gearchange lever is spring biased towards the 3rd/4th gear plane, and must be moved against light spring pressure to the left before selecting 1st or 2nd gear, and against similar pressure to the right to select 5th gear. The selection of reverse gear is inhibited by a plate at the base of the gear lever, above which a stop end pad must be raised by lifting a collar beneath the gear knob.

This allows the lever to be moved fully leftwards and to the rear to engage the gear.

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Drain the transmission when the oil is warm so that it flows more readily, and whilst the impurities are held in suspension. Clean the replace the drain plug when the old oil has drained thoroughly and refill ONLY with specified oil up to the level plug hole (approx. 3 litres). Clean and replace level plug.
 

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The translator consists of two parts: a swivel 'tree' and a pivot pin, the pivot pin hangs from a splined clamp which is secured to the cross shaft extension. The swivel tree which pivots on this pin via two ball bearing races, has two diametrically opposed arms at its lower end and a single arm disposed at 90° to the others, at its top end.

When the two gearchange cables pull or push together, the lower end of the translator is pulled or pushed, and a rotation imparted to the cross shaft. When one cable pulls and the other pushes, the translator is rotated about its vertical axis, but since the top arm of the translator is connected by a tie rod to a fixed bracket, the translator itself must pivot around the outer end of its top arm, thus imparting an axial (lateral) movement to the cross shaft.
 

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1. Disconnect both cable ball joints from the translator.
2. With the transmission in neutral, the gearbox cross shaft is spring loaded axially to the 3rd/4th gear plane. If necessary, adjust the translator tie rod so that the tie rod fixing hole in the translator upper arm is offset 4mm inboard of a fore/aft datum line passing through the centre of the translator clamp.
3. The gearchange lever is independently spring loaded to the 3rd/4th gear plane. With the aid of an assistant, hold the gear lever leaning backwards approximately 7.5° in this crossgate plane.
4. If necessary, adjust the length of the two cables at their rear end ball joints so that they can be connected to the translator without preload. Note that both gearchange cables are identical and that the right hand cable at the gearlever end is fitted to the left hand side of the gearbox end. As a check, move the gear lever across the gate from right to left and observe cable movement at the rear end. The cable that moves forward is fitted to the left hand side at the gearbox.
    

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Before any adjustment to the inhibitor plate position is made, first check that the gearchange cables are correctly adjusted. (see above).
If necessary, remove the centre console and gear lever lower gaiter for access, and adjust the position of the inhibitor plate for marginal clearance between it, and the gear lever pad when the lever is moved in the 1st/2nd plane.

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