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Slowly but surely, the 1988 V20 Sub

Right on! The NV4500 has to be my favourite trans to shift. As far as a truck trans goes. Never shifted a 3500 i’m sure it shifts better... sweet.

A Big block overcomes any wide gear splits. :whistle:
Had a 465 with a tired 350 in a blazer it was dog shit! Had two BB trucks, still have one, with 465s and are fine.
I’d love to have the OD with the 4500.
 
78K30 said:
Issue is ford put them in trucks with 3.08 gears most of the time. Couple that with backing a trailer on an incline leaves one frustrated. It’s no comparison ones a HD trans the other is a ranger trans
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The irony is that my NV3500 with higher first gear (and larger tires!) is significantly more fun than the NV4500 when towing. Yes, the granny gear hops off the line faster, but I hafta plan out my 2-3 and 3-4 shifts well in advance. Which is less fun than simply hopping from gear to gear whenever I like.

I'm not saying the NV3500 or M5OD should be used for a dedicated tow rig. The NV4500 has a longer life expectancy behind torquey engines. But it could have been a good HD transmission and ALSO had better gear ratios. It's not an either/or issue.
 
max 02 said:
Right on! The NV4500 has to be my favourite trans to shift. As far as a truck trans goes. Never shifted a 3500 i’m sure it shifts better... sweet.

A Big block overcomes any wide gear splits. :whistle:
Had a 465 with a tired 350 in a blazer it was dog shit! Had two BB trucks, still have one, with 465s and are fine.
I’d love to have the OD with the 4500.
Click to expand...

I’d love to have a big block in this at some point but until the 350 starts giving fits I probably won’t bother. Either BBC or 6.0 is the current dream
 
campfire said:
The irony is that my NV3500 with higher first gear (and larger tires!) is significantly more fun than the NV4500 when towing. Yes, the granny gear hops off the line faster, but I hafta plan out my 2-3 and 3-4 shifts well in advance. Which is less fun than simply hopping from gear to gear whenever I like.

I'm not saying the NV3500 or M5OD should be used for a dedicated tow rig. The NV4500 has a longer life expectancy behind torquey engines. But it could have been a good HD transmission and ALSO had better gear ratios. It's not an either/or issue.
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I’d like to try a 3500 behind my 454 actually.
Just kind of hard to find for cheep. As well as a 4500 nobody gives them away.
 
max 02 said:
I’d like to try a 3500 behind my 454 actually.
Just kind of hard to find for cheep. As well as a 4500 nobody gives them away.
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Maybe find a cheap donor rig like James did? I paid $200 for my NV4500 and $400 for my NV3500, which I thought were reasonable for used transmissions in unknown condition. Our local U-pick yard would charge $134 for either one, but I would have needed to wait for one to come in and then do the pulling. So I saved some time and bought the used ones (and then rebuilt the NV3500).

By the time I sold the NV4500 bell housing and the attached BW transfer case/driveshaft assembly I had recouped my $200 investment.
 
I’ve gotten lucky with both of my recent NV4500’s. The first I found at car country in newton and they pulled it for me for a grand total of $264. The one I just put in the burb came from a 1992 K2500 with a full float rear that had a Detroit in it for $500. The previous owner even put a new battery in it before dropping it off at auction
 
GWeakland620 said:
I've thought about it a lot actually. But now that I have a fresh rebuilt 4L80, I'll leave it as is for now.
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and its in the truck?

Besides within 3 months you will have some other old japlopy you drug home from somewhere. That can get that 80. Or sell it. Ot trade it for the 4500.
 
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The NV4500 behind my 8.1, I hardly ever notice the 3/4 split at all, even while towing. I feel like a good BBC that can rev up to at least 4500 rpm's and still produce some power, you'll never even notice it, cause no matter what you'll have the top end when needing it to be in 3rd, but then you shift to 4th, the BBC has the torque to overcome a wide split. Really the only guys who complain about it are diesel guys (cause those can't rev to save their life) or small block guys that don't have the torque or high end power to push through the gears (especially if they try to tow anything like that).
 
GWeakland620 said:
I’d like to eventually own something that I can do this swap in. Nice work dude!
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thanks Greg! I love this thing way more than I ever thought I would’ve, I enjoyed the TH400 for just mindless cruising but the 4500 is all around better at this point. I went for another drive tonight and found my fan clutch failing so that’s fun
 
78K30 said:
Edited for @campfire
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My 6.2 handled the split better than your smallblock. :deal:

Obviously the engine always overcame the gear split. It's still a bad design. The tarp on your roof may have always kept out the rain, but that doesn't mean your roof is working properly. It's a bandaid covering up a flaw.
 
Only place that split in the 465 pisses me off is that wee uphill on Vail pass and the Eisenhower tunnel grade. And that’s at 11,000’

I’d like to try a 3500. I wanna see if I can split it in half
 
Bent77 said:
Only place that split in the 465 pisses me off is that wee uphill on Vail pass and the Eisenhower tunnel grade. And that’s at 11,000’

I’d like to try a 3500. I wanna see if I can split it in half
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How much power do you think a 3500 can take?
I hear that they don’t like towing heavy, just say a empty truck, light duty trans only offered in the biggest truck being a half ton.
Just thinking!
Maybe I should start a new thread about it!?
 
FWIW, we have a 95 1/2 ton 2wd Chevy at work. It has a 4.3L with manual trans, wouldn't that be a 3500?

We towed our 71 Cuda from Virginia Beach, VA to Greeley, CO with it. Guessing that was a 6000lbs load with the trailer. That was 20 years ago and the trans is still going strong. The only time we couldn't use OD was in the western Kansas wind with the AC running. Course that was just 1 trip, not regular towing.
 
mrk5 said:
FWIW, we have a 95 1/2 ton 2wd Chevy at work. It has a 4.3L with manual trans, wouldn't that be a 3500?
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It could be, though GM has three generations of 3500 design, in addition to using similar units from other manufacturers (I.E., HM290). And then they have S10 3500 transmissions, which are different yet.

It would definitely be different than the 1999 4.8L single-shift-rail transmission that I'm using.
 
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