Jeff20B

iTrader: (13)

I swapped trannies in the white '83 yesterday. The old one was making lots of wonderful bearing sounds so I knew it would not last long. It has over 209000 miles on it. Still shifts ok.

While it was out I decided to pop off the flywheel and throw on a counterweight (correct for the rotating assembly), a new light steel fywheel and hopefully a decent pressure plate with the old disc, which still had plenty of meat left on it. The old pressure plate had an incredibly weak pedal feel and it looks a little different from the one I put in. The only thing I'm worried about is the disc as it's the old one but I figure it will work well enough for now.

I barely got the comparatively low mile tranny in before it got too dark to work. I assume it's a good used tranny and I know a little of its history so it's probably a safe bet to use. The shifter centering spring is broken and will get replaced when I pull everything back out for the 20B swap some time later this summer. It'll work well enough for now. I'll also change all seals at that time too.

The previous owner used ATF in the tranny! Oh noes!1!! I'm hoping that running it for now with some fresh 80w90 will dilute whatever's left and it will all get drained out when I change the seals in a few months.

Lastly, the old stock exhaust system was removed and will be replaced with a complete RB dual pipe exhaust system. I just have to pull it off the doner car. The old system consisted of an '81-'83 manifold, gutted monolythic cat, straight pipe main cat replacement "test pipe", stock connecting pipe and stock muffler. It wasn't all that loud with only the muffler as the chief muffling component. It just didn't sound very awesome. It will now.

After removing the exhaust manifold, I noticed the sleeves are light in color. That means lean. The carb needs bigger primary jets. They're currently 94 and the intake ports are '74 spec. I need 100 at least. Possibly 105, if that will work ok in an otherwise stockish Nikki. The accel pump shot and duration was increased and mech secondary wire tie mod was performed. It has a simplified choke and stock 20mm venturis.

This car had some zing before, but only on secondaries in the lower gears. I'm hoping the light steel flywheel and better exhaust will give it more in the low end until I can find a set of 100 or 105 jets. I certainly don't want to upgrade the ignition right now, which would burn even more fuel and potentially lead to an even leaner condition, until after the fuel delivery is up to par. I'd also like to tackle the sloppy steering at some point.

Glazedham42

iTrader: (4)

I love a good Jeff 20B post. Sounds like you are right where I am at with my project Jeff. I just put a light steel flywheel, new exedy clutch & pressure plate, and "questionable" trans back into my 83 GS last night. The tranny was shifting kinda hard from 1st-2nd before I pulled it. It wasn't grinding, just hard to shift. I'm guessing it had the original gear oil in it still. However, I noticed upon installation of the tranny last night that my mount is broken! Good thing I caught that at the last minute. I'm going to be replacing that in the next couple of days.

Do you think a bad tranny mount would cause a difficult throw from 1-2? GL on the project Jeff! Can't wait to see that 20B.

Jeff20B

iTrader: (13)

Thanks.

Did you check the throwout bearing while it was accessible? The old one on my high mile tranny was a little stiff and the 1-2 shift was slower than I'd like. The other tranny has a better bearing so I'll find out whether there was an improvement soon enough.

The old tranny had a bad mount too (rubber seperated from metal). It was changed for a new one but I forgot to install one of the rubber things on the side. This probably allowed more of the bearing noise into the car. Plus I swapped in a set of competition motor mounts Which really upped the noise. I can't wait to see/hear how things change with the the rubber thing back in place and the light steel flywheel.

This engine had a funny vibration at low RPM which I think was caused by the stock flywheel. It was resurfaced at some point and probably was not rebalanced. No problem with the counterweight and light steel flywheel.

Glazedham42

iTrader: (4)

I went the whole 9 yards on mine. New pilot bearing & seal, new throwout bearing, new clutch hydraulics, etc. I don't want to be forced to take the engine back out anytime soon. If it comes out of there it's going to be my choice not the 7's.

Kentetsu

Jeff- I always use a 50/50 solution of gear lube and ATF in my manual trannies. Recommended by a reputable source, and I've always had good luck with it.

The ATF still has plenty of lube power, but also lots of detergents which clean the crud out of the synchros and keeps it away. Reduces gear noise, grinding synchros, etc.

If he used 100% ATF, well I don't know about that. But I'll bet the tranny is probably fine either way. Good luck with it man.

Glazedham42

iTrader: (4)

Wow, I had no clue that you could use ATF in a manual transmission without damaging stuff. This sounds like a good way to clean out an old tranny and bring it back to life. I'm sure there is some crud and buildup in mine, so maybe I'll try this trick. So you just take any good quality ATF and mix it 50/50 with some 75w/90?

Jamie

bliffle

You might benefit from the additives in ATF, but I just use redline MTF in all manual cars and it works fine: smooths all shifts and eliminates bearing problems.

Jeff20B

iTrader: (13)

It sounds awesome now. The tranny's quiet and I got the RB dual pipe system up in there this evening. The system hangs about 1/4" too low for the steel tranny bracket. Also none of the rubber hangers line up. It's as if the whole assembly is shifted to the side. It's not angled or crooked, it's just not centered. The header is on correctly, the center section is fine. The muffler is level. Weird. It's only temporary so I don't mind.

Man what a difference. I don't know why these things didn't come with a light steel flywheel as OEM. And I drive an REPU with a stock heavy 30 pounder so don't give me "it's just too light to drive" or whatever lol.

I adjusted the throttle stop, A/F screw and accel pump nut and it smoothed the car out quite a bit. It's not herky-jerky anymore, or at least it wasn't for me after I adjuested those things after my first test drive. Maybe I just started to get used to the car? All I can remember about it before the swap was how difficult it was to drive this car smoothly. Now I think it's actually easier even with the lighter flywheel. Imagine that.

The primaries still feel a little on the weak side compared to the secondaries so the carb will get some attention next. All I could find were some 105s in a carb I'm not currently using. I hope this big a jump will be ok. Again the stock '74 carbs on 13Bs in REPUs came stock with 106 and Racing Beat recommended 105 since they were jetted rich from the factory to help the thermal reactor's internal flame to stay lit. Since the only similarity this engine shares with that are the ports, I'd think I could get away with 100s at least, but I'm hoping 105s will work since I have them and hopefully it won't be too rich since it's a 12A and obviously flows less at any RPM compared to a 13B with the same size ports. I guess we'll see.

PercentSevenC

I couldn't live without my light steel flywheel now. It's a night-and-day difference compared to stock. I suppose if you were just starting to learn to drive a manual, it might be more difficult, but I find it quite easy, even in heavy traffic or starting on a hill.

Jeff20B

iTrader: (13)

Yeah they really do make things better.

You want to know what is pathetic? An auto journalist wrote a bad review about the FD's stock flywheel back in '93 when it first hit our shores. He thought it was too light! He would either rev it too high and chirp the tires or appearantly not rev it high enough and stall it.

I can think of a couple things wrong with this picture. Either the guy is full of BS and not really a car guy, or must have recently had a bad accident and lost fine motor control of his left leg or something because I can tell you I certainly have not driven as many cars as he has, and yet I can drive something with a much lighter flywheel more smoothly than the stock one. Something doesn't add up here.

Consider the stock flywheel in an FD, which is heavier than a light steel, but a tad lighter than say an S5 T2 or what have you. In other words, a fairly stock feeling flywheel compared to what we have. Now if somebody could please explain to me why an FD is appearantly so difficult to drive smoothly in stock form for an experienced car-writer guy, yet plenty of people drive them daily with far more extreme pressure plates and puck clutches just fine, I'd really really appreciate it. Anyone? I'm sure that guy was full of beans.

Manntis

Some automotive journalists are more full of beans than a double burrito served on a coffee plantation.