So my car now has a Tremec TKO

So to give you the story to date up untill recently my car had a 5.0/AOD combo in it that came out of an 88 mustang that was on the loosing side of a car/truck accident. Both the engine and transmission had relatively low miles on them and the transmission also had a shift kit installed, when I purchased them from the owner who was parting the car out he gave me the paperwork to prove it.
Well I got it all in and working but it never shifted right, in any gear. Bought Lokar TV cables and the Ratio convertor for the correct TV cable adjustment, bought a set of MAC transmission guages to set the TV pressure across all ranges but it still never shifted right, one time it would upshift at very low rpms 1200-1300 the next time round it would not shift untill 4000 rpms in any gear.
So after searching and hunting for as much information as possible I came to the conclusion the previous owner beat the snot out of the transmission and I was due for a rebuild/replacement of the transmission.
While I was searching for my best options I was searching for rebuild kits, for full AOD's and I even started to entertain the idea of putting a T5 in it because it is a realitively easy swap and because I really miss banging gears.
Then low and behold I stumbled across a screaming deal on a NOS Tremec 3550 TKO with a pro 5.0 shifter sitting on top of it, that I just couldnt bring myself to pass up. (and Yes it is the tko it has the 26 spline input and the 31 spline output) It was bought originally for a 66 stang project that was sacrificed up to the horrible economy. And as I have complained.. I mean mentioned here a few times already I have been working stupid ammounts of hours. So it was a go, and I have come across a few really good deals, got a centerforce 10.4" DF clutch for $150 buy it now on ebay from a shop in california, it went so low because it had a torn box and couldnt be sold retail.

And yeah I miss having a 5 speed guess we will see how much fun it is






OK OK I will post some pics of it too.

Here is the $1000 bad boy (yes it only cost me $1000, total came to $1145 getting it shipped up here from reno) that has been taking up space in my kitchen for the last 2 weeks(seriously I have a carport and I wasnt leaving this thing outside) and yes because it has been in the kitchen all this time my 2 year old believed it was his chair/table/pony whatever you name it, so its not as clean and shiney as it was when I first got it.(and to be honest I think for the first day or two I played with it as much as he did) It does have the standard .68:1 overdrive instead of the road racing intended .82:1 overdrive.



Here is my DualFriction clutch


For those of you that dont know what a Dual Friction clutch is it has different friction material setups on opposite side of the clutch disks. This gives it a higher clamping force available with more of a streetable road manner.. Guess the easiest thing to do would be to show you

Here is the pressure plate side (note the input shaft splines)


Here is the flywheel side


So we all know that there has to be some transmission tunnel mods for this thing to fit in the tunnel because of all the different plates on top of the transmission. I have to tell you guys this honestly its allot less work then I thought it would be. Really all I had to do was trim the tunnel support bracket and everything else fits just fine there is probably about 3/8" of space everywhere else on this transmission the tunnel support was the only thing stopping it from just dropping in.

here is a good picture of the bracket im trying to hold the old peice there so you can see what I cut out


here is where it comes through the floor, (my car is an LDO car that came with a C4 and a stock floor shifter)


I will correct myself a little I did have to cut my transmission hump cover to go around the stop plate on my shifter



guess you guys wanna see it from the bottom dont you


Now some of you might recognise the high quality transmission crossmember I have holding that transmission up....(psst Frank im talking to you) The Tremec transmissions and the AOD transmissions have the same mounting points, all I had to do to get the AOD crossmember on the Tremec was clearance the back of the crossmember, personally I think it looks really good like that

Here is another good pic, this also shows my hydraulic clutch slave cylinder bracket but I dont have pics of the installed setup yet, just forgot to take a pic last time I was under the car for you guys and either too tired or too lazy right now to crawl under and give you guys a pic.


I have gotten a few things done since I took these pics, I put the driveshaft on(factory C4 driveshaft I am really thinking about spending the $300 and buying a nice ford racing aluminum one) and I am buttoning up the hydraulic clutch setup, the master cylinder is on and I just got the remote resivor mounted.
As I get closer to being done I will post more pics and hopefully next weekend I will be it again

 

Damn that looks like it gonna be fun.

 

Very Nice!! I know of one that's been sitting it's box for more than a year now..and I've been trying to buy it...

 

Oh and if you guys want to know im using a rosehill performance hydraulic clutch setup for the TKO

http://rosehillperformanceparts.com/Products_Page.htm#-:Tremec 3550, TKO 500/600 Bracket Kits:-

and a willwood 3/4" remote reservior master cylinder kit

http://rosehillperformanceparts.com/Products_Page.htm#-:Wilwood Master Cylinder:-

 

Nice install! Got any pix of what the M/C looks like mounted to the firewall and how it attaches to the clutch pedal? Is that part of your install a "bolt-in" or does it require fab work?

 

That's the stuff I plan on using.

 

I put the Master cylinder in what I assume is a similar location to where the clutch rod exited the cab. Unfortunitely this is a couple inches lower then where the rod is located at the pedals. ( I will upload some pics of it in a little bit.)
But as for the rod I am probably going to have to make my own version of their offset pushrod.
http://dazed.home.bresnan.net/test#7

One complaint I have about the willwod MC and apparently the CNC master cylinders are the same. But they use a 5/16-24 pushrod, which is fairly weak and they bend easily.

 

man what a great thread, can't wait to see it work. You running hard lines? what pedal assembly are you using if you didn't mention it already?

 

Im using stock maverick pedals right now and I have some braided stainless for the moment

Here is the master cylinder and the remote resivor mounted I did not know you could mount the master sideways untill today. If I had known that earlier I would have mounted the master cylinder on its side and run the line under the brake master cylinder and put the remote resivor right next to the brake master. But I still think thats a good spot.


Here is the slave cylinder installed on the bell housing as you can see I have tons of room (even with my headers)



Here is another view you can see the braided line going out the top of the slave



As for what I was talking about earlier with using the riser for the clutch master cylinder here is what it looks like inside the car where the rod is coming in, there is about an inch and a half difference between the stock pivot and where the MC comes in



Here is a side view, the distance between the two is greatly exaggerated because the rod is just hanging there, so it has a little bit of an optical illusion



I probably wont get much more done till this weekend, sorry guys dont have much more to update till then, man I hate it when that stupid work thing gets in the way. And hopefully I will be doing this come saturday

 

Well a little bit of an update, sad to say its not that much of an update but im trying.

The fuel pump went out on my expedition on my way to work on friday its got 244,000 miles on it so I figured its about time for it to go. But anyways I ended up missing work all day friday putting a new fuel pump in so I didnt get much done on my car. Anyways because I had to take friday off, I had to come in saturday to make up my time..Stupid mandatory overtime.

Well back to the car I made this super strong super awesome drop bracket for my clutch at work(breaks and lunches, if im not tearing down setup jobs) during the week that just wont work. its too dang big, It just wont fit in there so back to the drawing board.



See what I get for just trying to do everything off of memory, oh well I got some free time tonight, guess I wont be taking a lunch want to get everything ready so I can get it done.

 

So today I took off work, for three reasons

Number 1 was because my oldest starts school on monday she is 5 so she is really excited to go to kindergarten. So because I have been working so much I decided I was going to spend a little time with her since I work swing shift and I wont see her more then a few min four or five days a week.

Number 2 was because I wanted to do a little work on my car.

And the Number 3 reason.. I just didnt feel like going to work today. And because I dont take too much time off it wasnt a problem.


So after getting up around 10 this morning and playing with my three kids for a couple hours I went out to assess the clutch pedal situation, i realized I was trying to solve somebody elses problem.. Now I say this because all the information I have been looking up for a hydraulic clutch install have been for a mustang well obviously we dont have mustangs so I should quit trying to mimick all the mustang fixes for problems I have.

Then I realized that the solution to the problem is actually really easy.

I just pulled the pedals out and drilled a new hole. You can see where the original rod hole was located. The hole is a 5/16" and I placed it so that the head of the bolt is right next to the pedal arm(i think thats what its called) so it actually could be held in place with the arm itself and tightened with a 1/2" wrench.


I then put a grade 8 5/16-18 x 1 1/2"bolt through and then tightened it down with a washer, a lock washer and a 5/16-18 nut if you notice there is still a good chunk of thread sticking out, this is where a 5/16 heim joint will go. The nut and washers actually act as spacers and keep the heim joint away from the pedal assembly...... On a side note I actually removed the blue helper spring, about everything I read on a hydraulic clutch conversion they have all removed the spring.


I then reinstalled the pedals and guess what everything lined up.


I put a 5/16-24 female threaded heim joint on the master cylinder rod, and locked it down with a jam nut. (this view is looking down the steering column before I bolted it back up, you can see how well everything lines up with the master cylinder)


It moves freely through the full motion of the master cylinder, I set it so that it enguages at the top clutch stop. The full motion of the master cylinder stops the pedal about an inch from the floor. I am probably going to put a stop in so I dont damage the cylinder. I do have to finish bleeding the clutch so this weekend I will let you guys know how it works out.
So hopefully saturday I will have por-15 on the floors and be ready to lay peel and seal monday or teusday.

If anything I hope this helps you DDB

 

I started reading your post and thought... uh oh, will he still get full range of motion with that master cylinder? But you said the cylinder actually bottoms out before your foot hits the firewall/floor. Awesome! Great job!

I second the pedal stop, that way the load is off the cylinder when fully depressed. I do that with accelerators also, so that WOT is not limited by throttle plate stops. Just make sure you get WOT at the plates at the same time you hit the stop.

Good job man, I cannot wait to do my TKO install.

 

Yeah I was really worried about not having full travel of the pedal. Im just happy it worked out easier then I thought it would.
Hopefully when I get the system fully bled then it stays as easy as it is, i havent changed the geometry from the original pedal location too much so the force required to actuate it should remain fairly easy.
Of course if I want it easier I could probably put the blue helper spring back in and run it that way too.

 

Awesome! Thanks for posting all the pic's they do help. I like how it all lined up, that's amazing!!

 

I figured I better post for all of you that would consider using a drop bracket like I originally tried to do(that the mustang guys can use) but when I built for mine they wouldnt work, I actually built two of them, one bigger and one smaller out of the 5/16 heim joint(this is why I had a 5/16 heim joint on hand to try) instead of the 3/8 heim joint I had shown in the picture. But anyways its because of the pedal assembly itself. The way the pedal arm bends around the arm comes in contact with anything that is going straight back from the original mounting bolt.

In this picture here you can see how much it crosses over, so any drop bracket would have to come up at an angle to get around the pedal arm itself If it wasnt for that bend both the first bracket and the second bracket I made would have worked, this is what helped me come up with the solution I did.


Here I figured I would add that so hopefully nobody has to spend the time and money trying to do what I found wouldnt work without allot of modifications.

Also this brings me to a point where I should retract a statement I made eariler. I complained about the rod on the MC being 5/16-24 and it being too weak and having the possibility of bending. That was when I was trying to build a drop bracket for it, with the extra added side load stress there was a good chance the 5/16 rod would bend. But now where I am almost exactly inline with the MC the 5/16 rod should hold up just fine to the pressure required to actuate the MC