Hey guys I have a Jspec tranny going in this upcomming week. I really don't know what year its from but I'm going to just assume its from an earlier one, like 93-95. Anyway I know some of them have a shorter 5th gear but I'm not sure if that was only for the newer 7s or if that was in all japanese 7s. Hopefully its in mine. Does anyone know what year it started if they weren't always in them. Thanks

 

Someone's gotta know this

 

Try a search with 'short* 5th gear'

Dave

 

I just put in a Jspec transmission which was supposed to be from a 1995. It has a lower 5th gear. US Spec is .719 I believe and the J Spec is .802 or something like that.

Freeway mileage is down a little bit if I go over 70mph but you don't have to downshift to 4th to accelerate which is nice. The US Spec 5th is really gear too high in my opinion.

 

Glad to hear the 95 has the shorter fifth. Thats means mine probably does too. I'm not too worried about highway gas mileage haha

 

A friend of mine who works for Mazda Japan told me a few years ago the 5th gear has always shorter in the J-spec FD3S tranny since day one. He also believes the internal design was updated in '99 along the last round of mechanical updates. I'd be interested if anyone can verify this so I can better understand my experience.

My '94 R2 has a J-spec tranny that was new from Japan in 2001 (a story it in itself). I found it notchier and requiring a little more thought to shift in casual driving but absolutely dead-on accurate for quick shifts during a hard run. So I put a Mazdaspeed quick shifter on it too and well...my right hand has never been happier. 6000 miles later it's just as sweet as day one.

Jon

 

To figure out the gear ratio, it wouldn't be hard just to take off the tail housing and count the teeth....

I have the 0.806:1 installed in my car and I love it!