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Anyone got a 1500 transmission lying around?

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Morris said:
You know what I have that I can send you that will be a lot cheaper to ship than the bell housing? The back engine plate... Heck, I think even I can afford to ship that. It's on me if you want it.
Click to expand...

Thanks so much for the offer, but, don't bother. First off it's still across an international boundary but mostly because the drawing has all the information I need at this point (remember this is waaayyyyy preliminary) I'm still mostly at the thinking stage which, if you knew me better, you would know takes a very long time.
 
If you guys are thinking about making a tranny adapter do remember that everything needs to line up really close or you can easily burn everything out pretty easily (clutch splines, tranny bearings, etc)if it isn't.
I can give you a rundown on how I did mine (really easy) if you want to pursue it.
BillM
 
thanks Bill, I would be very interested in that either here or offline
 
I would not mind hearing it as well...
 
OK- I will work something up and post it here- this is definitely not rocket science but accuracy is essential but easy with just a couple of tricks.
BillM
 
Here is how I align the two types of trans-
There should be 2 pictures showing my "alignment jig". I made it from some scrap aluminum & wood that I had around. You can see two 1/8" holes in the first picture almost at the extremes. These are the "master locators".
This jig picks up the pilot bushing of the engine in question and drills two 1/8" holes in the backing plate, nothing more.
Next I take the same jig and modify the pilot to fit in the other engine's pilot bushing and drill the two 1/8" holes in that engines backing plate.
Then I take off the two backing plates and pin them together using the 1/8" holes, this defines the relationship between them.
One thing to watch for when you are drilling the 1/8" holes is that the two holes that you drill are at the same angle on each backing plate or you will wind-up with the trans off at an angle to the engine in the final assembly.
When I am confident that the two backing plates are in a correct relationship to each other (angular orientation) then I take one of the backingplates and transfer the two 1/8" holes and all mounting holes to an aluminum "master" plate.
When I am done transferring all of the required holes I remove that first backing plate and pin the other backing plate to the same two 1/8" holes as the first and transfer all of those mounting holes.
After the holes are all drilled in the master I cut out the plate around the holes.
That is it.
For drilling I use one of those Harbor Freight mill-drill machines and for cutout I use a common (metal cutting) bandsaw. Now too exotic but necessary.

BillM
 

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Great write up Bill! Thanks!

What transmission do you have in your car?
 
That is a very smart procedure. Have you got any suggestions for a method to use if you don't have the engine your donor transmission came from?
 
I have the Datsun 210 in my car but could do an adapter for just about anything that fit in the tunnel.
I would not try to do this unless I had both engines to model off of- trying to do it from the tranny input shaft would never be stable enough to be accurate.
I am making up an adapter to put a Datsun 510 5-speed in my MGA and to do that I found a seized-up 510 engine to model off of.
BillM
 
Brillant !!! Why can't I ever think up stuff like that? I thought folks used the Datsun Z tranny in MGA's?
 
Morris said:
Great write up Bill! Thanks!
Click to expand...

:iagree: Thanks Bill. Question though, (trying to get this straight in my head - there's a reason I didn't become an engineer) :square: Assuming that I don't have access to both engines but only my engine and the new transmission. could I not assume that the shaft coming out of any transmission will come out perpendicular to the face of the bell housing? In other words, If I could manufacture a bushing with the Inner diameter of the transmission shaft and an outer diameter of the flywheel hole, and, accounting for spacing issues, could you not even align it by tipping up the engine and laying the transmission on top? At most we would be talking tolerances in the small thousands which would be overcome by the flex in the motor mounts.

Thanks for helping me understand this
 
I wouldn't try that given a choice. You want to get the shafts aligned within about .005" or .010", much more than that will burn out the the splines in the clutch and the bearings in the tranny.
You could try but I would be very wary.

What is the tranny from? Would it be easier to advertise on Craigslist or some such for a burned-up or seized engine and then throw it away when you are done?
For all of the work that it takes to do this it would be a shame to get it misaligned.

Bill
 
JP\I put a couple of pics ~HERE~ and i will mail the trace to you today.

m
 
awesome thanks! (I love these boards!)
 
Hey JP

I have been gearing up to work on a similar swap idea ever so slowly over the past couple years. Did I say slowly?

Here is a little background on the Hyundai Pony. While the original may have been based on a LBC the similarities end there. The Canadian market got the Pony starting in 1983. The US market never got the Pony in the RWD form only the later FWD Pony based on the Excel. Hyundai sourced the drive line for the RWD Pony from Mitsubishi and used the KM-119 5 speed and the KM-110 4 speed. These are of an all aluminum integrated bellhousing design. In the US this transmission was also used in the Plymouth Arrow and the 1977-1979 RWD Dodge Colts both of which are somewhat hard to find. The KM-119 looks like it will fit in the Midget tunnel, but does have a few other problems to be overcome. First is that it uses a cable clutch set up. Second is that while the starter is located on the left which is needed for the 1500, it is high up and may interfere with the distributor. There are many other issues to be addressed, but that comes with the territory.

Rich Ball
’76 Midget
Everett, WA
 
Rich
When are you going to bring that by to test fit? I still have a "running-gear-less" body on the trailer.
BillM
 
Rich - thanks so very much for that information - I have not actually seen one and figured I would be best to have the dimensions before I started looking. there's a certain back to the drawing board at this moment, but, onward and upward - thanks again
 
Oh, and what are you contemplating swapping?
 
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