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Tranny time!

Starfury

Well-Known Member
Transmission time, I mean:p Tomorrow I'm swapping my newly(ish) attained close-ratio toploader, complete with cleaned, greased, and adjusted Hurst shifter, into my fastback to replace the stock sloppy 3sp. I even bought a brand new (well, the package looks 15 years old) white Hurst shifter knob to top it off.

I may steal my roommate's camera and take a couple pics. Wish me luck!
 
You are gonna love the T-L! As posted in Craig's thread, to make it easier to install, you can thread in a couple headless bolts to help slide it into position.

Good luck.
 
Thanks. I may do that if it decides to be uncooperative, but I'll have it on a lift at school, plus I'll have a tranny jack handy, so I don't forsee any real issues.
 
Tad,
Sounds like a road trip to Menlo Park on 12/20 might be just what the doctor had prescribed for you to properly break in that new top loader.
 
Hehe. Well, while I'd like to, it's not really in the budget right now. I need to make sure I can make it home (stockton) and back for xmas and still be able to pay rent and bills.

Next month may be a little better. I get three paychecks next month :D
 
"65fast" said:
What gear are you running in the rear?
3.25's with 24" tires. I do a lot of freeway driving, so I need something that can do 65-70 all day.

Well, I just got home. Project took much longer than expected, mostly because of the damned speedo cable. First I had to cut the alarm wires to get the old cable out, because the alarm wires were plumbed through the speedo cable firewall grommet. I don't use the alarm right now anyway because my key fobs are just about kaput, so I figured I might as well rip the thing out. Then I had to figure out wth to put the new cable, which goes on the opposite side of the transmission. After some research, I decided on a relocated clip and a zip-tie to keep everything off the exhaust.

As a side effect of cutting the alarm wires, I discovered that I now have to start the car from the fender solenoid. Forgot the alarm had an ignition cutoff. No power to alarm, no power to fender solenoid from ignition switch. Great.

I also have no tach, because I managed to yank the bullet connector off the ground wire while disconnecting everything behind the gauges.

And for some reason the speedo bounces like a sob now. I may squirt some cable lube down the housing when I pull the dash to fix the tach. Hopefully Sunday, as long as it doesn't rain. The speedo is also off because I put the wrong gear on the end of the new cable. Not because I calculated wrong when ordering, but because I pulled the wrong one out of the box. I actually got two, so I have another one if I go with bigger tires in the future.

OTHER THAN ALL THAT, it works pretty well. Shifting is buttery smooth with the Hurst shifter, although I need to get used to the new shift pattern. It's easy to overshoot the 1/2 gate and try to downshift into reverse. I do need to open up the shifter hole, though. The shift lever hits the back of the hole in 2nd and 4th, and it gets really close in 1st and 3rd. It's not enough to pull the tranny out of gear, but it bugs me. I think a little time with a jigsaw should do the trick.

I gotta say, I absolutely love the close ratio gearing. First is tall, but no worse than the 3sp was when I had stock 2.79 gears. After that, I love it:D It's amazing being able to select the right gear for the speed I want to go, and not have to lug the engine or rev it to 4k when I don't want to. My tach isn't working (and it's raining), so I didn't really play with it too much, but I can see it being very convenient for performance driving in the future.

Anyway, I'm out. I need to be up in 6 hours. Ugh.
 
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