After tearing up 3 stock trannys the past 2 years, and patiantly waiting for a solution for the V160 or t56. I decided to go ahead and give it a shot. I'll be using a 2005 GTO T-56. I found a decent deal on one and it arrived today.

Here is few pics of the stock tranny and the GTO w/a 13b RE auto bellhousing and adaptor.




As you can see they are nearly the same length overall and the GTO shifter sits about an 1" farther back than the stocker.
I'll be mounting the transmission this weekend and taking final measurement to adapt my Tilton slave cylinder to the new bellhousing. and order the clutch discs.

I had the engine face of the bellhousing machined down a 1/4" because the t56 input shaft was a little short in this bellhousing. I would still like to find out how deep a FD auto bellhousing is just for comparison.

I'll take more pictures when the tranny is mounted in the car.

 

I will be installing an aftermarket shifter in the near future. The stock one is a little sloppy for my tast. this is what I am thinking of when it is released.

 

Ok I have the tranny in place. It is a heavy sucker. The shifter is placed just about perfect in the FD opening.



I Measured for the driveshaft and clutch release assembly. I'll end up getting a different slave cylinder. that the one i have.



It has an adjustable install height for push style clutches. and they have a pre drilled adaptor for the Mcleod tranny adaptor plate that i'm using.

 

Nice work! Any pictures of it in the tunnel? Do you think it would fit if it was moved 6.5" back? Thanks for sharing.

 

Why would anyone need to move a engine 6.5" back from stock, are you building some crazy supercar for the street? Oh, nevermind.......

 

I really doubt it. it was a tight fit to start with. I had to remove one of the tooling setup tabs on the drivers side to get it centered. I'll take some pictures of the tunnel when I make the crossmember / mount.

 

Yeah a super bank account destroyer

Thanks.

 

I'm sure a lot of people would appreciate costs and sources for everything except the tranny. I know I would. Great work, and good luck.

Thanks
ryan

 

.........HHHMMM....i just happen to have a 2004 GTO Transmision in my shop just sitting ........damn you iron .....before this i was just wondering .....now i am actually considering this swap

 

That's actually what I'm currently doing now. Moving mine back for better center of gravity and polar moment.

 

What exactly has been the common problem with all these tranny's?

 

Stripped the teeth off of 3rd gear on 2, and broke the mainshaft on 1. All 3 time were done w/o power shifting just rolling on the throttle to spool the turbo at 17-18 psi.

 

I built the tranny crossmember / mount today. It is a tight fit with the 4" exhaust. I'll post pictures of the underside when I get my cammera back on tuesday.

I really don't see it possible to move the tranny back 6.5". The girth is alot bigger then the FD's.

 

OK it is all installed minus the driveshaft and torque arm that will be here next week.

Cost soo far
Tranny - 1450
Adapter plate - 230
Tilton Slave - 279
Slave adaptor- 99
Clutch disks - 225
Driveshaft - 265
Torque Arm - 295
Shifter **** - 30
Dakota Digital Box 80
VSS & backup connectors from ebay - 22
Energy suspention mount - 25


Like I said before the tilton Slave setup is adjustable and could be used for any "Push" style clutch, not just tilton.
Here are some pics


Slave Cylinder with feed line and bleeder line


Tilton twin disk clutch


Tranny installed with exhaust connected.

 

All in all not too bad. I cant wait to drive it and turn up the boost.

 

More info on the tilton release bearing system.

http://www.tiltonracing.com/content.php?page=hydraulic

It used the GM T-5 adapter for mounting.

Tilton's instructions
http://www.tiltonracing.com/ins/98-1110.pdf

 

Looks great. Can you get me a picture from bottom so I can see how much space is on the sides of the case near the mid section and tail?

Re. the Tilton, I was thinking about using that with my Carbonetics push-type clutch to gain some more clearance on the side of the case, but I don't have much confidence in the stock gearbox, so I decided to table it. Very nice looking piece though. Where did you get the flywheel made?

 

Unorthodox made the flywheel. If I remember correctly Mazdacomp sells one that fits a tilton / quartermaster.

 

Any updates on this? I know I am REALLY interested in your results.

Thanks
ryan

 

Is that transmission brace strong enough? Nice job so far

 

The loop under the exaust I used 8" schedule 60 steel pipe. It is .40" thick and strong. plus added an extra peice on either side with the curve back to back. you can kinda see it in the pics. And the pictures don't do any justice anyways.

 

update:

The past month has been busy. I spent a week in Canada fishing, another in Wyoming gatting ready to start a new project. and then Last week a hailstorm that tore up my roof and siding on my house.

The torque arm is in, I'm just waiting for the driveshaft which should be here anytime. I hope it will be here before the weekend, because I'm going out of town again next week.

 

Very cool indeed. Where did you get that shifter for the T56?

For those interested in installing a T56 into their RX-7's with rotaries that are moved back further you can have the shifter position moved forward 4" by running a Viper tailhousing. That also requires the Viper 30T output shaft (much beefier) vs. the stock 26T output shaft.

Steeda (Mustang stuff) makes a shifter handle called a "Tri-Ax" which puts the shifter ball back about 2-3". I would imagine if you flipped it around you could have the shifter move forward as well.

 

First drive this morning. Shifts fine at 8250 , so I am happy. I modified the stock GTO shifter by cutting off mist of the handle and welding on a bolt to math the shifter handle threads. It will work for now till a few other options become availible. The throw is shorter than stock but not like a true aftermarket shifter.

Gear ratios are great and seem to match the power band well. Now to make time to tune it for more boost.

 

Excellent! Glad to hear it works at high rpm.

If you don't mind my asking, did you do anything to make sure the input/pilot bearing assembly was aligned properly? From what I've been told that is important, and it seems like the margin for error is very low.