Hewland and Wooler 5 speed 3 rail gearboxes

[profjohn]

Sorry if this is the wrong place, but the TT members do seem to be very knowledgeable about the '60s scene!
I've got two of the 5 speed Hewland/Wooler gearboxes and I've dug them out today having not looked at them in years. One has a magnesium casing and no remote and the selectors look much like those that occasionally appear on these and other pages. You have to lift the gearlever for first and reverse.

The other is in a 2821E cast iron casing and has a completely different selector arrangement. Although all the gears select when I move the rods, I can't work out how to get first and reverse using the gearlever. Anyway, both are helical, face dog boxes and are clearly related.
According to the guy I bought the mangesium cased box from, some 15 or more years ago, it came from a Broadspeed Anglia in Ireland. The iron cased box didn't have a back story. My guess is that the mag cased box is a Hewland and the iron cased one is a Wooler for the Cortina/Elan/Seven market.
Anyone have any thoughts?

[morninggents]

Both rare and both valuable today, I would guess. I would agree with you that the magnesium cased unit is Broadspeed/ Hewland and the cast iron one is Wooler. I had a Wooler remote change/lever hanging around for years but sold it quite a few years ago. I seem to remember it was an alloy uinit and shorter than the Cortina Lotus/GT item. Probably made for an Anglia. Can't tell you much about the spec of the boxes you have though I think both would be direct 1:1 top gear. From what I remember the Hewland box was used on 1000cc engined cars only (possibly 1200/1300cc cars) as the gears were too weak to handle the power and torque of 1500/1600cc engines owing to the need to make the gear sets small enough to fit the Anglia/Cortina boxes.

I have a friend who worked for Broadspeed back in the day and I'll ask him what he knows about the units.

[profjohn]

Originally Posted by morninggents

I have a friend who worked for Broadspeed back in the day and I'll ask him what he knows about the units.

Thank you, it would be good to learn a bit more about them.

[morninggents]

I've heard back from my ex-Broadspeed friend who confirms what I said about them only being suitable for small capacity engines.
If you send me your email by private message I will forward the couple of sheets of info he sent me.

[profjohn]

Thank you, I'll send you a pm.


The plan is/was to put one of them behind an all steel 1300 with a downdraft head, which shouldn't overwhelm the gears. My 1600 would probably be too much.