Im thinking about using a turbo350. i dont care that its made by chevy, they take alot of abuse. has anyone ever, does any one know about doing this. any help would be great. thanks. and dont just tell me how much you hate chevy.
Never saw that conversion myself but I run a power glide behind my 347. Is a fairly easy conversion but a bit exspensive. Have to cut the PG bell housing off and buy a good SFI one to match the Ford block. Then a turbo 350 converter and new flexplate with an crank adapter for the stub on the converter. Drive shaft mod's and also dipstick like a Lokar flexible one. There is an adapter plate to use but it has not been reliable and caused many trans problems in the past. Don't know what engine and trans you have now but assuming it is a C4, if built right and a "good trans cooler", will take a lot of abuse in street and strip use. Forgot to mention the HP lost in turning the bigger transmission applications, excluding the PG and C4.
I have seen cars running C4's over 1000hp... But they do not like rpm's over 8500, In that case you would run a TH400...
I am not 100% positive, but I believe ATI (or JW) makes a bellhousing that will adapt a T350 to a Ford small block. If not, you'll have to use an adapter plate. Either way, pick up yourself a heavy duty intermediate sprag, a trans shield, and a GOOD rebuild kit. The sprags almost always break, even the "heavy duty" ones so keep your old one for a spare instead of selling it for scrap iron. Jeez I think I broke about 5 sprags in my old truck--which was a sub 300 HP 355 with a cheap shift kit. Oh, and by the way, I may have a few T350 parts in my shed if you need anything. I know there's a manual valvebody (with modulator plug), case, etc. Matter of fact, I think there may be a HD sprag in it too. I need to dig it out and see but if you're interested let me know.
because of what killercomet said Justin Burcham from JPC racing has an 05 4.6 3v mustang with a TH350-400...good enough for low 9sec passes
In our case, Ford never made a 2 speed auto transmission. So we are forced to use either a C4 (3 speed) or a Powerglide. I am not a big fan of using a GM transmission, but it does an EXCELLENT job compared to the C4. Main difference is starting line ratio. On a bracket car with a lot of power, it is very easy to overcome the tires with the 2.46 first gear ratio combined with a 4.86 or 5.12 rear gear (1/8 mile racing). The 1.76/1.82 first gear of the powerglide is a little easier to made decent power yet still be able to cut a decent 60' time. Only down side is expense and because of that high first gear ratio, the converter selection is absolutely critical! It will make or break the combo, much more so than it would with a C4. As for making it fit, JW performance makes bellhousings that bolt to the pump of the 'glide and will adapt it to almost anything. Including VW beetle engines, Mazda Rotaries, Mopar, Ford, Buick-olds-pontiac-caddy, of course Chevy, and more that I can't think of right now. The powerglide is the hot ticket for fast bracket cars--very strong (good for up to about 750 HP in very close to stock form), light, uses very little power (11 HP parasitic losses is what I am told compared to 26 for a C4 and about 65-70 loss through a C6) and they have a huge aftermarket support. The T350 though, well, they are good transmissions, but they have their downfalls. The sprags are weak. They eat up a lot of power to run them meaning that they aren't real efficient. When the sprag lets go, it fills the entire fluid system with metal. Converter and all--and it's not uncommon to lose much more than just a sprag. They're kind of a pain in the butt to rebuild one as compared to a C4, even a C6 for that matter. Not hard, but not nearly as simple. They're heavy and the case tends to crack at the front right side where the cooler fittings are. There is also a long shaft T350 and a short shaft T350. Then there's a T350C which is a lockup converter style T350, similar to the difference between a C4 and a C5. Same basic transmission but there are differences that you have to know about. Then to add insult to injury, there's a TH200 (not the overdrive) that looks identical to a TH350 to the untrained eye with the exception of the modulator--the 200 doesn't have a modulator. The 200 is a turd--very weak, similar to an A4LD, it was originally designed to be run behind 2.8 V6 and 3.8 V6, neither of which had anything more than 150 HP. From a performance standpoint, the C4 makes more sense behind a Ford. It's cheap, strong, and plentiful. In stock form, they aren't all that great but add a clutch in the forward pack and a GOOD valve body, and they will put up with as much abuse as you want to put it through. Jeez, the one we have in the Mustang has seen thousands of passes at the strip, and it is literally a very VERY stock build. 5 clutch forward drum and a manual valve body. That's it. And when I say thousands of passes, I mean literally thousands. It gets POUNDED on! We usually try to break something. That is how that car has to be driven. When it breaks, luckily the C4 will be easy and cheap to fix. A rebuild kit actually increased in price recently. I think they're up to about $70 now.
Yep, they did. Probably wasn't worth diddley though... Was used into the early 60s for low line cars. Sorry... you all know how much I like to argue! Edit: Btw, I have a Super Ford from the 90s where they outline a 200r4 swap into a 5.0 Stang, for drag racing strength. Weekend warrior type racing of course. They acted like that OD tranny had it all over the AOD. Made it look like an easy swap too. Has this swap faded away since then? Just curious...
Weight, is a large factor... well it is for me. KillerComet, has one of the best street combo's that I know of and I feel he overkilled (goodthing) right where he needed to. The PA trans can take one heavy pounding. I guess if you listened to a miller lite tv ad that would be the C-4 LESS weight and VERY strong. This would be a great place to put one of my favorite saying. Speed costs, how fast do you wanta go? As always just my .02 Bossmav
There's no reason to put a 350t in a Ford,C4 is better/lighter/cheaper.Only GM tranny worth doing would be a powerglide,and they suck unless you are having traction problems and need to kill some off the line torque.JMO
