...are new process 3 speed O/D transmissions for Chevies? I know some eighties pickups had them. Been pondering one of these for my 36 Chevy sedan project. Any reason I'd want to avoid them? The Mopar 3 speed O/D seems to be holding up OK behind my hemi. I'd kind of like to stick with a manual trans, I want an O/D, but I think the T-5 might not like the kind of torque I'm hoping to make. What do you all think?
A Ford Racing World Class T5 will handle all kinds of power. The stocker will break without even thinking about it. My brother's '96 Mustang GT broke a trans so we stepped up and put a World Class in it. Best $$$ he's spent on the at car since he bought it.
How big is the Hemi ? The torque output will be wildly different depending on displacement and state of tune.
The hemi in my coupe is a 365 CID. Not quite sure what flavor of sbc is going in the 36 Sedan will be a 350 crank in a 400 block making 377 cid. It'll have a pretty mild performace cam something like a 268. I'd like to go the stroker route(400 crank in a 350 block) but I think the destroked 400 is more in my price range. That brings up the price of a good world class t5 They are pretty pricey, aren't they?
I had three of them, they are all gone now. Two of them are behind BBC and holding up good. They were pretty common in the early 80's pickups. There ought to be tons of them out where you are.
If you want an overdrive out of the deal, I think you'll probably end up with some flavor of T5. They seem to have ended up behind anything that wasn't front-wheel drive. Very common, and thus relatively affordable. Here's a couple pages I found on manual 5 speeds in general, T5s in particular: http://www.moderndriveline.com/Technical_Bits/t5_history.htm http://www.allfordmustangs.com/Detailed/349.shtml http://carcraft.com/techarticles/116_0404_gear/ If you want to be sure of handling all the torque, Tremec T65 6-speed (found in Viper, C5 Corvette) is the ideal. Way expensive though. Dave
I ran one of those trans in my 62 Chev shortbed for years. It worked really well with the stock 3.90 rear gear. One thing about it was that it did't like fast shifting. it's still taking up space under my bench in the shop. I hope to find a use for it again someday.
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