Toyota Repair: clutch replacenent, shaft bearing, input shaft

Question
hello, i'm thinking about replacing a clutch on an'81 toy tercel. the manual says to remove the engine someone told no just to drop the transmission. who's right? would i have to remove the halfshafts from the differential if i drop the trans? thanks.

Answer
Hello Steve, welcome to my expert page.
Under no circumstances do you have to remove the engine, there is a fairly easy way to do this and you don't even have to remove the driveshafts, even though I have not done this repair in a long time, I'll try point out some of the things that make it easier.
This transmission uses a an input shaft that is removeable from the bellhousing,look at the top of the bellhousing from behind, you will see a plate that has(I think) five 12mm bolts, remove this plate(do this before removing any bellhousing bolts)after the plate is off you will see the input shaft bearing, pull it out,you may need a couple of small screwdrivers to grab it at the snap ring but it will come out with the input shaft attached,remove all the bolts and likages etc and the transmission will swing bak and down and hang by the axles and you can replace the clutch.