The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Driveline transmission support

I replaced the 4sp granny low with a new process a833 (rpo my6) on my 53 3/4 ton.
I replaced the 5:14 rear with a 4:11 and had a one piece open drive shaft made for it.
the trans has a pad under the tail cone that would sit on a cross member support if there was one on my truck.

my question is should I put one in or just let it hang like the old one did?

thanks
rolf

Yes go with a trans crossmember especially now that you've made a long driveshaft. Make sure it's balanced, these things can go crazy if out of balance. Don't know the max length for a driveshaft but do know if she's to long can cause catastrophic failure. Be safe

If your bell housing has the side feet mounts, it is typical to cantilever the trans. The bell housings I've seen on that tranny do not have side mounts. If no bell housing mounts, you need cross member tranny support. As you can tell, this tranny was made to be supported like an automatic is. Three point install, two motor mounts and one tranny. You can use a universal, tubular, adjustable cross member sold by many vendors.

I guess I'm overly concerned as this is a 3600 came with a two piece drive shaft. A friend of mine totalled his 3600 after swap to long one piece driveshaft. The front u joint gave up and it pole vaulted off the side of the road.

Jim/Rolf, put a sturdy U-shape 'safety strap' under the front of the driveshaft, like a race setup

Bill

125" WB for 1953 3600 is same as after Chevy went open. I think the 55 1st series standard 3600 had one piece open driveshaft. With proper/same size Ujoints/propeller shaft as they had, don't see a problem. The 55.2 3600 had one piece open. WB is a tad shorter. I had a drive shaft break at about 40 MPH, it can be real dangerous if the front goes. Safety strap won't hurt a thing. You must pay attention to pinion angles with all these swaps.

Yes.....a driveshaft safety loop will prevent the pole vault. I've witnessed that before. I've also experienced a front ujoint retaining clip failure at 90 mph. Man it shook so bad it broke my cast iron bell housing and broke two ears off my Muncie 4 speed. There was " a whole lotta shakin goin on"

thanks guys.
what does a safety loop look like?
where does it go?
the bell is the same one that was on the 216 I swapped for the 235.
the trans has the std chev 4 bolts to the bell.
i'll put the support in too.

thanks again
rolf

rgie, here's what some different styles look like. If you had the right tools, you could probably make one pretty cheap out of some scrap steel.

Brian
http://www.jegs.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/KeywordSearchCmd?storeId=10001&catalogId=10002&langId=-1&Ntk=all&Jnar=0&itemPerPage=60&Ne=1%2B2%2B3%2B13%2B1147708&searchTerm=deive+shaft+loop