That hole going into the case is from where the clutch fork pivot ball used to be, when the clutch went out it must have yanked that out. So likely nothing was thrown into the trans itself.

As for damage to the teeth, they look good in the pics. That spot you see on each tooth on the output shaft in the middle of each peak is machined there for easy identification during assembly. The ring gear will match, one notch in each tooth is for the 3.94 final drive.

As for taking it apart, remove the bolt holding the shaft in for the reverse idler gear, wiggle the shaft out. Remove the 2 bolts holding that fork into place and pull out the fork, gear, and reverse lockoff. Remove the plastic clip on the crossover selector shaft.

Flip whole thing over and remove rear cover. There's 2 snap rings under that, remove those. The guts press out of those bearings, there's a special fixture for that, but somehow people have been able to take it apart without it. I've never tried and don't feel the need to put myself through that kind of frustration.



That all comes out at once, and needs to go back in at the same time. To fully inspect it, both shafts need to be disassembled (20 ton press needed for output shaft). They have goofy snap rings that kinda suck at times. The bearings under the gears can go bad but still seem fine for a while before they seize a gear to the shaft, and each gear has a fibride material on the stop rings that wears out over time. If your trans is pre 98, it'll likely have brass synchros on 1st and 2nd.