*** 5 SPEED MARINA GEARBOX CONVERSIONS FROM £30? ***

[snowy]

Not sure if anyone has looked into this but the vauxhall omega box, 2L, is cheap to buy and there are lots of them.

It may not be suitable though.

[Alan The Exocet]

Steve the point about the extra weight being not just the odd kilo but a lot lot more kilos,really rules out any 5th gear advantage due to the weight aspect and the extra weight and under neath work supporting one that such a unit would require so i'm not going to bother,the bulk of my driving is town work anyhow and the Marina would only be a hobby car so perhaps the 4 gears is well enough for my needs.
I really like the idea of the spline adapter because it looks cheap and easy,but the miles i would do a year in the Marina a pukka 5 speed box would never pay for itself so at this time ill stick with the crunchy 4 speed i have in the car at present.

Alan

[MarinaCoupe]

Alan,

The £30 conversion will always be a bit misleading, as whatever box you selected, you would still have to buy the gearbox (say £70-£100 or more), measure, design and fabricate an adapter plate of some kind (maybe £100), work out clutch activation and the actual clutch pack (£50-£100), get a new propshaft made up or adapted(£100-£150), adjust the bodywork for the gearstick hole etc., revise carpets etc. (£???). So say low side £320 or highside £450. Plus the cost of the spline adapter.

The kits for MGBs etc. are in the £1000 to £1500 mark. We reckon that you could do it all with our Type 9 V6 kit for around £400-£450, of which our kit is £100. the overall cost would be more if you buy a fully reconditioned box (around £300-£400 on its own) rather than a good used box. The difference is that ours in on the shelf and as it has already been done, so there are people to talk you through it.

At the end of the day each person will chose their own option for their own reasons. When you modify your car it's your own rules.

[Alan The Exocet]

Get your point Chris,i think Russ meant this more as a talking point (mind you with the stuff he has stocked and believe me he has tons and tons of stuff Marina/Ital A30/35 engines and gearboxes as well for al type of cars,as i said ton and tons of stuff i bet he could do it for that price!) rather than a direct cost,but if you have an old five speed box in the back of the garage you could be there when i was in the motor trade apart from a gearbox that i would have had to buy ( or trade some work for ) all the other stuff i could get done for little or nothing,i had as much steel bar/strip in both mild and stainless for free that i wanted,the lads next door were top quality welders TIG/MIG to x-ray spec and would have done any work to make a support at the most for the price of a drink.props i can still get get cut and balanced for £25,and Kay's dad will laser cut me a back plate for free if i supply the plate steel, i used to work for a parts company so still get all my stuff at cost or i would ask Ray the General i bet even now if i pulled all my favours in i could get the job done for very little (a benefit of living in a big engineering city) but i will do non of this no matter what box i had even if it was free if i need to chop sections out of the car.
I still think a sleeve adaptor set up could work if power take offs can use them surly a marina can how much hammer would one of these take on a tractor.
Chris before i sign off i think the product you offer is dirt cheap,£100 is nothing today in fact £400 for the entire job is still really good,but at the moment £400 would be worth more than the car,so thanks for your replies this has been the most interesting post on this forum for months,and you really know your stuff every success with them.
Alan

[The original northen boy]

Ay up Al,

I still think the idea at least for the spline adapter has some degree of promise in it,but i won't be able to investigate the concept anymore,a shame but as is the case with me time is of such a premium that i need to allocate so often to as a when anything can be under taken.

Yes you are correct i still have a bit of stuff in store,but i'm giving away the entire stock of the industrial unit lock-up to Ray along with the Marina GT just as soon as i get a spare weekend i will keep the stuff at my end and at my parents house but the rest has to go (Frank all your parts are safe) the MK1 tax exemption Marina is going as well,along with the MK1coupe,I'm trying to get down to just "Nell" the pick-up if i can and perhaps a certain MK3 but as you know so well i have so little time i just can't do anything.

Those were the day's all when we had all that stuff to hand,we were very fortunate on reflection and in the right area too,i don't know where prop-shaft Paul has gone to since they moved,but his Brother Alan is a regular client so any CNC work is not a problem.

I thought they would have been some more feed back on this subject but i suppose that Chris and Steve have covered most of the technical details and issues even with the *** 5 SPEED MARINA GEARBOX CONVERSIONS FROM £30? *** topic title and as Chris so rightfully say this is a tad misleading but really that's what it was supposed to be,prices do start at £30 but everything else is extra then again perhaps this is not a gripping subject,and to tell the truth really it isn't sorry.

Russ
Beckett Bros " Rip it up and start again" :roll:

[locost_bryan]

Stating the obvious, the problem with any gearbox swap, is that so many modern cars are FWD. Gearboxes for modern RWD cars tend to be designed for higher powers and are therefore larger and heavier. Finding an appropriate box that is readily available, not too heavy and will fit under a different car without too much body modification is a matter of trial and error. Perhaps the best source of modern gearboxes that might fit would be BMW's, who generally seem to like RWD only vehicles.

Dare I sauggest the Mazda MX5 as a gearbox donor. The M-series has nice close ratios (about the same lower ratios as the Marina), is small and compact, and handles reasonable power.

[Kilroy]

How dare you..!?

Whats the bellhousing look like..?

[Alan The Exocet]

I got told to day a great conversion for o and b series engines is the Toyota 1600 Corolla five speed for the rear wheel drive cars from 1974-1983 and is light too just under 60 pounds (dont know if that includes the bell housing) a T9 Sierra/Capri box weights around 73 pounds (without bell housing) and the old Starlets for the a series,dont think i fancy a Japanese gear box but bet your bottom dollar its a smooth as silk.

Alan

[Gee tc]

HI,
I know of a guy running around Chester in an A35 witha Midget 1275 engine and the Toyota box mentioned above.
It's his daily driver too.
When talking with him he said that the Morris Minor centre did a bellhousing conversion (in Oxford I think) for this adaptation. He gets some strange looks when keeping up with the modern machinery!

T

[Number 63]

Yep the Toyota 5-speed conversions were popular-ish before type-9 ones but those boxes would be hard to find now. (As are some type-9's) As said though, would prolly be as smooth as silk.

[locost_bryan]

How dare you..!?

Whats the bellhousing look like..?

Integral bellhousing iirc. Photos and discriptions on the link I posted. Variant of the same box also used in rwd 626 (possibly 929), B2000 pickup, and E1800 van (different case to fit the bigger F-series engine).

[locost_bryan]

Yep the Toyota 5-speed conversions were popular-ish before type-9 ones but those boxes would be hard to find now. (As are some type-9's) As said though, would prolly be as smooth as silk.

iirc there are conversions around for the Midget and MGB, for box K50 and T50 Toytoa boxes (T50 from the 16v rwd Corolla GT, great box, getting hard to find, popular with the drifting crowd ).

[locost_bryan]

iirc there are conversions around for the Midget and MGB, for box K50 and T50 Toytoa boxes (T50 from the 16v rwd Corolla GT, great box, getting hard to find, popular with the drifting crowd ).

MG Midget to Starlet 4K 5 Speed, MGB to T50 and MGB to Supra. An eye watering $NZ3,500 - $4,000 (2,000GBP :shock: ) including box .

[Kilroy]

That does it - I'm sticking with the original..

[snowy]

Just change your enhine to suit the rwd gearbox you want.