pezter22

I just purchased the Tremec TKO600 kit from Silver Sport Transmissions for my Z51 '84. The kit arrives Tuesday (tomorrow). I am having the kit professionally installed at a local performance shop. Hopefully all will go well.

Silver Sport acquired Keisler Engineering. They have been very helpful and their turn around was fantastic. And better yet, everything for the C4 kit was in stock.

I'll post more photos after the install later this week.

Benny42

Very nice car you have there. You will LOVE your car when your done, you won't miss that clunky 4+3 for a minute. I know i don't!

ray1979

let me know how you like it. I have the TKO 600 in mine and it shifts nice but has a little whine in certain gears. Let me know if yours does that.

hcbph

My 86 had a Tremec transplant in it when I purchased it. Found out something just this last week that's a carryover. Mine has a Dakota Digital convertor to change the tranny signal to the speedometer. Turns out my speedometer is off a couple of miles per hour and wanted to know how to adjust. Got a response on how to adjust and you need to do it while driving. Well when whoever did the swap out, mounted it under the hood so it's impossible to do it from inside the car while driving.

Just be aware in case you run into the same issue.

ray1979

I mounted the speedo box inside with wires long enough to reach me. There are two buttons on it u can hit it up or down a few times then take it for a ride to see where you are at. There are only a few wire so moving or extending the wires to the passenger compartment should be easy

c4cruiser

So how sis the installation go? Any issues or problems with fitment of the C-beam?

As time goes by, I think it will very difficult to rebuild the 4+3 OD unit as it looks like some parts are no longer available.

SilverOverdrives

More photos please.

SilverOverdrives

Cutting of the torque arm is not required.

mcm95403

Nothing for the later cars? Seems like it would (at least almost) be the same kit, or is the bellhousing a problem?

SilverOverdrives

The real purpose of this kit is to replace the problematic DN 4+3 trans used from '84-'88. It retains the factory bell, flywheel, clutch, driveshaft and hydraulic actuator arrangement.

The ZF 6 speed debuted in 1989 and from what I understand, is reliable.

I suppose the TKO could be swapped into a later model using earlier parts but I don't see it making much sense to do so. Good question.

STEVEN13

Makes sense to me if there are other options, as ZF parts won't be around for ever.

Would love to see a box with dog ring slider/hubs. Looks like G-Force makes it for a T56 while retaining a fully synchronized overdrive.

Nice to see a vendor catering to the C4 market!

Regards,
Steve

Tom400CFI

Couldn't you jack the rear, run it and make the adjustment?

hcbph

Sure, could do that but I'd like to do it once and be done with it. The PO put 245/50-16's on the car which accounts for about 2% of the difference but it's off almost 7%. I'm thinking as soon as I can swing the right tires maybe see if I can get it on a chassis dyno for about 10 minutes and have them run it up to 60 mph and adjust it to be accurate.
Problem I see it is without some gauge to adjust the speedometer to, how to know if it's right or not.

Tom400CFI

Easy. GPS your speed or have a known good car tail you on the hwy at a fixed speed...say, 60 mph for example. How far off is your speedo reading, and in which direction? What is your RPM?

Jack car, bring up to same RPM (in same gear), adjust speedo into your chosen mph (in this case, 60 mph).

DanZ51

The only issue with jacking it up and running it at speed (other than obvious safety issues) is the have shaft u-joints have quite an angle on them. My vette didn't seem to enjoy that to much (at low speed even). I would rewire it to make the controls much more accessible. My DD SGI-5 sits in the old ashtray area (since removed to make room for the T56 shifter). Use a GPS to calibrate, there are a bunch of smart phone apps that make this too easy.

hcbph

My phone makes and receives calls only and I don't have a standalone gps. The other week I did some timings based on mile markers, speedometer is showing 64-65 mph running cruise and the engine is turning about 16K rpms on a 60 second mile. I figure that once I can replace at a minimum the rear tires to oem size, it will bring it back closer, then maybe try the dyno idea to get it right on. Hate to do a lot now if it won't be right later.

mcm95403

My understanding is that the ZF is VERY expensive to work on/repair and there is also the problem with the dual mass flywheel no longer being available. The regular flywheels give a "coffee can full of rocks" sound from the trans at idle.


I don't have a ZF car, so I'm just going off of what I've read here on the CF.

Tom400CFI

Copy that. It's just that earlier, you warned the OP and commented that:
....I pointed out a way that you could fairly easily work around that problem, both for you and the OP. including not one, but two options for checking your speedo. If you'd rather wait, buy tires, then spend $$ on dyno time, that is another way to do it too. But the take-away here is that adjusting it while running is not "impossible".