As I have posted before, my wife’s transmission went out in her 2.2 96 cavalier. I usually do the work on the cars but I have never done any transmission work. Is a tranny swap something that can be done in a day without special equipment?
My wife spoke to a gentleman that has a used three speed from $150 and will install it for $450. He is claiming that he needs to change the transmission mounts (?) and the shift linkage also needs to be replaced when the tyranny is swapped. Is this right?
No it's not necessary to change the mounts and linkage if it's from another 3rd Gen J-Body.
The tranny can be pulled from above (w/ the motor) or below (drop the sub-frame). I've done both, even with experience, it's a full day's job by yourself and both methods can be just as complicated. If you not overly mechanically inclined with plenty of tools, $450 isn't that bad.
Thank you Mr. MadJack.
I know that I could do the transmission -but- if you say $450 isn't bad it is because it is a lot of work. I am going to call the guy tomorrow.
$450 isn't a great deal, but it's not bad. At a shop rate of $75 per hour, that's 6 hours of work. That sounds about right for one person with a well equiped shop. It took me longer than that to change my TC, that's alot of time crawiing under and over the car! Plus the time to clean up and put everything away. Of couse it took a while to clean up all the mess after my tranny tip over dumping alot of fluid!
MJ,
Is there anything esp. tricky about doing 1 of these by yourself?
What, if any, special tools do you need just to swap out one out (not to rebuild it)?
Does the subframe hold the tranny up or can you just drop the subframe and put a jack under the trans. until you get done unbolting everything else?
Depends on which way you go at it. You can pull it from the top or bottom. Either way you pull it, you need some thinner arms and long reach to get at all the nuts and bolts.
If you pull from the top, you'll need to pull the whole engine and you'll need an engine hoist.
If you pull from the bottom, you'll need to raise the car high enough to get the tranny out and a couple of extra jack stands to support the front subframe and a transmission jack would be a great help to balance the tranny. Overall, I'd say through the bottom is easiest. Just make sure you diconnect the steering u-joint(under the dash on the fire wall) when you drop the sub-frame and reconnect it when your done. (Yeah, I learned that one the hard way, cost me $80 for a new air bag clock spring.)
tools required would be
4 jack stands
two jacks that go fairly high (car needs to be at least 20" in the air if removing from bottom)
transmission attachment for one of the jacks
flex gear wrenches (10,13,15,18mm)
sockets up to 18mm
30mm axle socket
t55 torx bit
pry bar
i can appreciate why it could cost $450 to swap a trans, after doing it.
i'd plan more than one day if you do it yourself.
14.82 @ 97 mph
