4spd to 5 spd swap completed (questions)

[Guest Anonymous]

so it took me almost 10 hours last night to complete the 4spd to a 5spd on my 71' 240 and change the gear oil in the tranny . So its all in and no big problems BUT the shifter. it sits so far up, it will only go into 2nd, 4th and reverse and BARLEY into nuetral. so today i cut about an inch off the top of the hole and had to cut a peice of the figerglass center console finisher (oh well, not to happy about that). DID anyoen else have to do this? i dont rememebr the year of the 280zx i got it off, is thier a way i can check which 5spd i got acording to brian littles ratios?

 

so i took it for a spin and OH @!#$ great i forgot i needed to replace my clutch too, it slips when dumped. BUT i remembered that im swaping my 90k L24 with a 10K L24 with a performace cam i got for free, so il change the clutch then.

 

PS!! I AM NEVER!!! doing a tranny swap again by myself without proper equipment and more than 2 jacklstands. THAT WAS IMPOSIBLE, took 2 hours alone balancing the tranny on a ****y floor jack and aligning it to fit the tranny shaft into the clutch assmebly. and thier was MUCH more stuff involved then i had expected, i didnt know how hard it is to screw on a 25 lbs starter wile holding it in one hand and trying not to cross-thread the bolts witht he other. also, the filler bolt on the tranny was torqued down so hard, i had to drop the car 3 times witht he breaker bar on the bolt to break the bolt loose.

 

 

anyway, i did take it out and it drove perfect, all gears worked great, not bad for a $100 junkyard 5spd i pulled myself. too bad accel still sucks witht he stock rear end.

 

it was a good experience, but i can tell by now the motor swap is going to be easier. Droping an engine with an engine hoist wile guiding it into the tranny is MUCH easier than trying to fit a tranny into the engine, holding up the back with one hand and lying in a pool of leaking gear oil, then ahve to tighten all the bolts again still soaking in the gear oil.

 

g-bye for now

 

- one month owning the 240, and already i got electronic ignition, a 5spd, air dam, rear spoiler, repaired body damage/rust and r200 halfshafts awaiting an r200 swap in the future and ovcourse working full time.

[Mike C]

My first junkyard 5 speed was broken. I had them in and out 4 times! (Thank god for the lift ) As far as shifters, I first bent the 5 speed shifter with my torch to match the shape of the 240 shifter, but it was WAY too short. I finally got a second 5 speed shifter (from the replacement junkyard tranny) and a second 4 speed shifter. I cut the two just above the pivot and welded them together to get a shifter with the 5 speed length lower and 4 speed lenght/bend upper. Perfect. I swapped in a 3.54 r200 at the same time, but acceleration still sucks. My 5 speed is a '79 with the 2.95 first gear. I've got my eyes open for a 3.70 LSD still which should get it back to the 4 speed overall first gear.