Okay my dad has a question for the experts. He has a Late model Borg Warner 5 Speed tranny that he is wanting to run behing a 350 Chevy. Does anyone know what bell housing he would need to use? This uses a hydraulic Throughout Bearing. PLease help? Trying to get ready for Austin....
The General (as in General Motors) wouldn't do it (put a T5 behind anything stronger than a mild 305), so I wouldn't do it either (pick a stronger transmission). Ed
hey dirty...i just put a new crate 350 in the coupe and i got a borg-warner 5-speed out of an 86 iroc-z camaro which had the 350 option in it and i used the same bell housing that i had on there with the saginaw 4-speed, it bolted right up no sweat, and i got a hydraulic clutch setup too. what i had to do was fab a new crossmember for the tranny because the rubber mount on the end of the tranny is angled. i just drove it for the first time with the new drive train in it last night and it works great...here's a couple before and after pics of the crossmember...mike
dirty, i forgot to mention that my hydraulic clutch is with a slave cylinder and the conventional fork, i misread where you said your dad had the hydraulic throwout bearing. and the jury's still out on how well it will hold up. i'm hoping with my light car and no big power driving it, it will hold up ok. mike
Rusty, I went by yer pops shop and checked the #'s on the tranny. It is a 96 F-body (Camaro/Firebird) Word Class T5. Its got a different bolt pattern that a regular Chevrolet trans. I'm gonna try to research it a little bit.
Good work Thirtycoup! Thanks for the pictures and tech. You'd think that the IROC tranny would handle the 350 sbc if that was a factory option. 'Not clear on which bellhousing you used though. You said it had a Saginau 4 speed bolt pattern, but what is the bellhousing out of? BTW, does the 5-speed shifter location work out very well for your coupe? Kinda far back, isn't it? How do you like it now that you've had it installed for a few days?
hey southfork....all i know about the bell housing is i got it at a local swapmeet several years ago and i was told is was a standard aluminum bell to fit any sbc and a 4-speed, sorry i can't elaborate any more than that. it appears to have the same 4-bolt pattern that i have seen for years on the sbc bells and trannys. as for my 5-speed out of the iroc, i did some research on the 86 irocs to get more info about the tranny. it seems that the 5-speed was only available if you ordered the 350 racing option in 1986, if not you were stuck with the auto. i read that same information on several different websites so i'm taking it to be true however i still don't know if it's a standard T5 made for the 305s or if it was a beefier version to handle the race package option. at any rate, i'll let ya know how it takes it, the more i beat on it this summer! later man....mike
by the way, the shifter location ain't bad, i'm getting used to it. it's actually 4" further back requiring a notch in the seat. in the future i might whack off the shifter handle and weld on something else, i'll see. here's a pic of the new location and the notch in the seat. later man, mike
I don't know about a "racing option", but Everything I have heard and read is that T-5s were only put behind 305s in the 3rd gen camaros and firebirds because they were deemed to weak for the torque the 350 put out. In the tuned port 305s the t-5 was a stronger "world class" t-5. I have never seen a factory 350 /5spd car made during 82-92, but it could be a rarity. I guess since it is a '96 5spd that would have made it come from a v6 car. might want to see what their torque rating is.
I don't know how good this info is, but a guy down the road who currently has a For Sale sign in his '88 IROC told me today that there were only something like 100 IROCs built in '88 that came with the 350/T-5 option. Could be different for different years, but he indicated that factory originals are pretty scarce. His is the 305 version. He said you can tell the factory original with the 350 by the T-5 shift knob which is squarish as opposed to being round on the more common 305 version that he has. He thought the T-5s were the same whether 305 or 350, though. I was hoping this guy was selling the '88 Camaro cheap, but such is not to be ($3,500). 'Course it only has 70K miles on it. Thanks, Mike for the info and the picture of the interior of your coupe. That shifter postion looks OK to me. I was worried that it would be further back. Later, Jack
The Jalopy Journal
