Level 10 Auto Tranny Upgrade – Has Anyone Done It??
 

My brother was street racing a turbo Eclipse last night and blew his tranny with his 290rwhp FD. We knew it was a matter of time with that power on the stock auto tranny.

Has anyone done this upgrade and what is his or her opinion of it?

Ya, he was ahead when it blew. They were nice and helped him get some tranny fluid so he could get home.

Thanx

Ken

the supra guys seem to have nothing but problems with level 10 autos

I have the level 10 torque converter and PTS upgrade kit (which consisted of clutches, bands, gaskets, etc.). I did not get the valve body recal, etc., as this would have necessitated sending the tranny to Level 10. You can no longer buy a TC from level 10 outright I believe. I think you have to send in yours for them to modify. Now the TC I got from them looked nothing like the stock one. I wish I had taken pictures. The level 10 one was huge! I haven't had any problems in close to 4K miles, but I was only putting about 260 to the wheels. We'll see what happens after the rx6 goes on! My trans guy thinks the ATF is more important than the gaskets, etc. I am also going to upgrade the trans cooler. What kind of ATF did your brother run? Was he brake torquing (I never have with the new tranny, but did with the old one before it blew)? Another consideration is that trans heat is conducted to the rear rotor, so you should keep it as cool as possible. I really noticed a difference in the heat coming out of the trans tunnel after the rebuild. If you take level 10 parts to your local trans shop YOU WILL NOT GET A WARRANTY. Level 10 does not warranty their parts either. If it blows this time I will go with a 5 speed (I would really like to have the dogbox discussed elsewhere on the forum)! Labor was around $3K. Good luck.

Unless your brother REALLY wants to keep an Auto tranny in there (cant think of any logical reason why) Its time for a 5spd swap..

Check out the thread here why...

https://www.rx7club.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=80788

link doesn't work - for me, anyway. I guess I should add this in too. At the time I had a lot of trouble getting the parts from Level 10. I had to constantly call and stay on their asses and they lied to me several times telling me it had shipped when in fact it had not. When I finally got the parts I debated for a long while whether or not to have them installed, given their lies and incompetence in filling my order. But, knock on wood, I haven't had any problems. I think the order was delayed by them having trouble finding a TC to mod. I can see that, and I didn't mind waiting, but the lies...

I also noticed that the Supra owners pretty much hate Level 10. I saw the post a few months ago about Level 10 and they ended up getting a bad reputation from them. If your brother is about to spend some money on his tranny he is much better off spending extra money on a 5 speed. JR just did the 5 speed conversion and he loves it.

Sorry the link didnt work before....

Here is the old post I was talking about....The way I see it, once the stock Auto tranny dies its worthless to rebuild or mod it. ESPECIALLY if you want anything over stock HP levels


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Ok the auto's arent that bad, but if you havent made a car purchase yet and your serious about performance, there is no question....get a manual.

If you already have a nice auto FD (as I do). Wait for the tranny to give out and do a 5spd swap.

I'm not one of these automatics can not be sports car freaks, but the auto in the FD just plain sucks ass. And severly hampers the "moddability" of the car. Its generally accepted that a stock auto FD tranny will fail around 300-350rwhp

And its too expensive to modify/improve the weak points (rear end gears, Torque converter, gear ratios)

There is very limited aftermarket support for the Mazda R4A-EL.

Do a search, there's countless people who dump thousands in mods and can barely muster stock 5spd 1/4 mile times.

Cheapest route:
Rear end gears (4.33) $500 + $500 install = $1000
Torq. Conv (higher stall) $500 + rebuild stock tranny $2000 = $2500
Install labor $1000

Total = $4500

Full on route:
Rear end gears (4.33) $500 + $500 install = $1000
Level 10 Performance rebuilt $3300
Torq. Conv (higher stall) $500
Install labor $1000

Total $5800


Auto to 5spd swap:
Parts (collect your own) $1000
Labor $1000-1500

Total = $2000-$2500

What you can do is get a Chevy Turbo 350 tranny and get a adaptor bell housing and drive shaft. 350 turbos are what one of my friends uses in his 600hp nova and it has seem to be holding up.

Good idea, where and how much $$.

Thanx for all the comments so far.

Ken

I have to say that if you bolt up a GM auto tranny using a differnet bell housing and adaptor plate by all meens that is your best route if you want a supre strong auto tranny. hell my 86 is putting just over 500 RWHP at 502 and havent had any problems with my turbo 400. You can get a GM auto tranny from a junk yard for about $200. Stick with the Old Muscel Cars or any F-body Trans since the Corvette trans will cost more since it came out of a corvette. If you want you can get a complete GM atuo trans. they make like 4 or 5 different types, try and stick with the 400 series since they have the over drive and some of the 350 series do not. To build a GM trans to where it can handel well in excess of 650 RWHP will cost you about $1,500 the trans if you buy new will run you about $1,000-$2,000 depending on where you get it from. Try doung a search on yahoo for TKO trans since they are built extreamly well. and they have applications that handel a shit load of power. Hope that helps

Thanx for all your advice and help. My brother dodged a bullet. It was an $89 hose that blew. He knows he has to do something. The stock tranny will not take that much power when he races it. He has many options available.

1) Convert to a 5-speed. He does not like the Mazda 5-speed. He drove my car two years ago and power shifted it and almost wrecked my tranny. He basically said the tranny was crap, he is used to power shifting his Dodge Hemi 4-speed and that can take the abuse.
2) Upgrade the auto to handle the power.
3) Sell it after taking the performance stuff off. It’s a 31k mile car with a 1k-mile rebuild Akins motor. Sell the performance parts.
4) Drive it careful in the summer and hope it does not blow and sell the performance parts, the engine and tranny and ship it to Granny’s for a V8 Chev auto conversion over the winter.

Here again Thanx.

Ken