All right you Ford gods.... I have an anomaly that became apparent the other evening. Hopefully you can shed some light on the case differences between these two early small case 3.03 trannys. First off let me give you the specifics that I know on each tranny. Be advised that I am having a hard time reading the codes on both cases but I'm pretty sure they both start with HE_ but the last digit which would be very helpful is hard to make out. At this point I'm not sure that either one is in it's original state. The first one is a long tail, large 1.375 input, seemingly close ratio trans with the early small front bolt pattern. The strange things to me on this one are the following: I thought only trucks with Y blocks got the 1.375 input (there are rumors of big inputs behind big blocks like on the 4 speeds but I can't find anything definitive), Trucks should be short tail It is close ratio which isn't truck. Haven't counted teeth yet but the ratios appear to be; 2.6 first, 1.6 second, and obviously 1.0 in third. It has a cracked ear on the case but I planned to put all the guts into another case I have and put my T-150 shifter on top. Notice the top cover pattern is what you'd expect. Here are pictures Now for the second transmission and even more mystery... It is a long tail, small front pattern, 1.0625 diameter input, wide ratio trans. Exactly what you'd expect to find in a mid 1960s Ford car. However it has a weird top cover pattern. When I lay its cover on the first transmission the holes all line up except the back row with are all wrong and the cover is about a half inch too short. Here is cover from this transmission laid on top of the large input trans. I've been told that some of the toploader 3 speeds that got used in GM cars are longer or shorter, but what seems weird is that this one clearly has the early Ford small front mounting pattern. Teach me.... Jeremy
The first one is a early FE application (late '63, 64 full size car), you can tell by the length of the pilot shaft on the input. On all the other ones, this is about 1/4" longer. If you use a non-FE toploader trans in a FE application, you have to shorten the pilot shaft or it'll bottom out in the crank. If you go the other way (FE version behind a SBF), you have to use a steel bearing in place of the normal pilot bushing or the input will hog out the bushing because you won't have full engagement. The other one is the 'light-duty' version, used behind sixes and the early Fairlane small blocks (221, 62-63 260). Not a performance trans.
I was under the impression that the 6 cylinders used the 2.77 transmission with the 4 bolt top cover. Is that not always true? What do you make of the large diameter input shaft?
Which case does the T-150 tower fit on? First example or second? (what are the length measurements in inches of said top cover plates?)
The T-150 lid is over at a buddy's I need to go pick it up. I'll get some length measurements tonight.
I'll clarify this... The four-bolt cover trans was used behind the 'small' sixes (144, 170, 200) in the smaller cars but Ford was still using the 223 in the full size cars through '64 and it needed a bit heavier trans, as did the 221 and 260. That's where you'd find that one. The big input on the one was for the FE, Ford eventually figured out it wasn't needed except for the Hi-po motors and reduced the size. I bought one out of a '65 full-size, it still had the big input. That was one bullet-proof trans... Installed in a '58 Ford, I broke virtually every drivetrain part at least once but never hurt that trans. This is when Ford was still doing development work on these new-to-them trans, they eventually simplified the product line and some of these variations disappeared.
Ok, Thanks, that's interesting. I hadn't realized that. One thing I did come across is this ad for a trans a guy has on Ebay. It's very similar and he talks about the Y block gear ratios. He says the V8 got a 2.59 first gear. That would match almost perfectly what I find when I mark and spin the shafts. https://www.ebay.com/itm/57-58-59-6...ash=item3d5668792c:g:JFMAAOSwk~xZgnJh&vxp=mtr I wish there was a much documentation about these early ones as there is for the 4 speeds and later 3 speeds. The first couple years of the 3.03 seem pretty murky.
I don't doubt that there was some truck variants, the Y-block lasted two years longer in the trucks. And the Y-block and FE shared the 'short' pilot shaft on the input, so that could be a truck trans, although all I've seen had a yoke at the output, not a slip spline.
Right. Any trucks or vans I've seen were short tailed. So then it just comes down to gear ratios. I'll try and post some part numbers when I get it torn down. I think most of these have been rebuilt so it's hard to say what's really in there.
Ford drivetrain options were in a state of flux in the early 60s. They were preparing to phase out most of the '50s designed stuff (with the exception of the FE and the venerable 9" rear) and knew in '61 (if not earlier) that they had issues with their manual transmissions. Lack of full-syncros was one issue, but horsepower had caught up with them too and their main supplier Borg Warner wasn't interested in doing any upgrades. The top-option T85/R11 OD unit was marginal at best behind the '61 Hi-po 390, as was the T10 with the 406. The 427 just put an exclamation point on the weakness of the T10. Ford concentrated on the three-speeds initially, producing a number of variants. This is one reason they fell short on four-speeds initially, forcing them to go back to the T10 on the small-blocks when production lagged. But by '68, they were in full production and had settled on three basic three speeds and two four speeds (the T10 was finally gone). The three speeds were the light-duty 4 bolt cover used primarily behind the 170 and some 200 sixes, this soldiered on into the early '70s in the Maverick/Comets. The medium-duty was used behind the bigger sixes and small V8s, the big one behind the FE and later, the 385 series (very rarely). There were still minor variations (mostly ratios), but these were the 'basic' trans used until the modified four-speed 'overdrive' trans appeared in the late '70s. I'm not including the imported-from-Ford-of-Europe Daganham four speed used in early six cylinder Falcons, Comets, and Mustangs. This trans was marginal even behind a six, and Ford discontinued it quickly.
I will be interesting to check the gear widths and see what got bigger or heavier on the V8 one. To just look inside them everything looks identical. The guy I got them from had a couple more early ones. I'll have to check next time I'm by there to grab another one to replace the cracked case.
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