I've had this 5 speed Doug Nash "4+1" for many years. Love the gear spread: 3.28/2.13/1.57/1.24/1.00. On the street with a 3.50 rear gear and fat, fairly tall rear tires, it's been a good tranny... Until I hooked it up behind a 650 hp blown Olds 425 ci motor in my '55 gasser! I've rebuilt it 3 times now, replacing 3rd, then 2nd, then the input gear set, and of course cleaning it up and replacing bearings as needed! But now 3rd is gone again. I rip teeth right off both gears in a set when they go. This last time I could get a replacement main shaft 3rd gear (Up to now, Richmond Gear has always had replacement parts for this tranny), but the cluster shaft 3rd gear is not available, and Richmond Gear does not know if or when it will ever be available again! I did a temporary fix by machining a spacer to put on the cluster shaft to replace the ruined 3rd gear, and drove it for awhile shifting 1-2-4-5, skipping 3rd. That works just fine, the other gears work great, no problem, but I wanted my 3rd gear back! So I squeezed my credit card hard and bought and put in a new TKO 600 Tremec 5 speed, it seems to be holding up pretty well so far... The gear spread on that tranny is: 2.87/1.89/1.28/1.00/0.64 I should have gone for the optional 0.82 overdrive 5th gear, it would have been more useful here on Maui.... That will improve once I swap out the rear gears from the current 3.50 to a 4.11 or even a 4.56. Now the question, just what do I do with my old Doug Nash, toss it in the recycle pile?? I've been looking around, Craig's List, and ebay, for a used DN or RG of the same spec that I could buy and between the two trannies put together one good one, but have not found anything so far... Or, I could pull mine apart and sell off the parts a bit at a time, the gear sets are all good except for 3rd, the main shaft and cluster shaft are good, and the case is good. I could probably do ok to piece it out and sell the pieces like that, but my preference is to try to make it whole again. Any ideas out there?? Aloha, Willy
Call Liberty Gear, (Michigan I believe?),they still work on them and know a guy who is "THE" Doug Nash go to guy. By the way, THAT guy, might be John Hightower (Hightower Transmissions) in South Carolina. He works on them too, and may have parts also.
Funny, I was googling doug nash 4+1 and ended up finding a 2014 rebuild thread on another board, I got most of the way thru it be for I noticed the Aloha, Willy and figured out it was your post.
Yeah, that was me, The first time I blew that tranny, it was at the track with sticky slicks, a 4.56 rear gear, and an aggressive launch. 1st gear held up, probably because I was smoking the tires, and 2nd held up, but when I slammed into 3rd, it let go... Rebuild time... But I did get a couple good solid low 11 sec. runs at about 120 before it let go.... The next time was about the same, except 2nd let go... Enough busting trannies at the track, but I blew the input gear set out on the street, rebuild again, and this last time, 3rd gear, again out on the street, and the tires were not particularly sticky... So I've been babying it after putting that 3rd gear spacer in, and now with the new Tremec, it get's babied... (well.... sorta....) Aloha, Willy
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