Well the truck is now a 5 speed daily driver!
First of all, a huge thanks to lugnutz for his "How To" postings.
My install was pretty much text book easy. I shortened the input shaft on my 1352-146 tranny (from a 1985 S10 with v6) .5 inch. I made the input shaft bearing retainer the same length as the stock one on the SM420 tranny, had to shorten it I believe 1.5 inches (going from memory if wrong I'll let you know).
I used a RockAuto, 11" clutch disk for a 1988 Astro van, (less than $50.) . It was necessary to lengthen the splines on the input shaft (Dewalt angle grinder and cutting wheel) by about .5".
Used original low mileage pressure plate. I cleaned the fly wheel and pressure plate with 80 grit sandpaper.
Drilled out tanny case mounting holes to .5", used stock bolts in top holes and two new bottom bolts 2" long.
Welded a Model T shifter (picked up at the Petit Jean swap meet last fall) to the S10 shifter. I didn't want to destroy the original shifter.
Did away with the original two piece driveshaft and had a new 3.5" driveshaft made, 1350 series u-joint on rear, stock S10 3R on front along with the stock S10 front yoke.
Built a transmission crossmember from 2"x.25" flat stock bent at 45's and boxed with 3/16th" X .75" flat stock. Used stock S10 mount. (note the torque multiplication devise that helped drill the mounting bolt holes in the frame).
That's about it,,,no big issues on the install. But now for the problem...I bought a junk T5 for $100 and the input shaft bearing was totally gone, just pieces in the bottom of the tranny. I had a new bearing installed and gave the inside of the case several diesel and gasoline wash jobs along with a couple of high pressure water clean outs. I feel sure I got all the old bearing and race material out.
(I did drive it about 5 miles after the conversion and then drained the ATF fluid to remove any remaining junk, I refilled with Harley Davison Synthetic 20W50 with a bit of Lucas Stablizer in an effort to quieten things down.)
A very close inspection indicated no wear problems on any of the gears, but due to my inexperience I didn't remove the mainshaft, just reassembled with new input roller bearings and input shaft bearing along with a new flat bearing. I was not able to use a inputshaft spacer (under the little flat bearing) since I had zero endplay with no spacer.
Now, the tranny whines in every gear including neutral. Push clutch in and all's well.
I've put around 500 miles on the conversion and the junk T5 shifts great, no jumping out of gear or anything it's just noisy.
I'd appreciate any comments and thoughts. I have been quietly looking for another transmission, the perfect one will have a 4.0 first gear and a .72 or ,68 5th gear, but man I can't stand 7 or $800 that I'm seeing.
Ron
Added in edit, just discovered I can't post images. Lugnutz, can you share the ones I sent your way?
Thanks!
Last edited by moparguy; 02/12/2016 4:59 PM.
