diluded000 Posted June 27, 2005 Share Posted June 27, 2005 The swap from a pushbutton 4wd to a dual range 5-speed is all finished and running in my '85 wagon. I wanted to put together a collection of notes on things I couldn't find answers to before I started. This was my first attempt at anything like this, so some of these things might seem like no-brainers to the more experienced. Seperating and attaching the motor and transmission First off, the clutch stays with the engine. This was a bit of a mystery until I saw this pulled apart. There are four studs that are supposed to stay with the transmission, and nuts that hold the motor against the transmission. When these are removed there is a male splined shaft coming out of the motor which will slide off. This is the only thing that mates with transmission to make the mechanical driveline connection. About half of my studs came out of the transmission, and half had the bolts come loose. I pulled the motor and transmission together to get to the bolts easier. This may not be the easiest way to do this. There is plenty of info already around on how to pull a motor and/or transmission. To seperate the motor and transmission from their 20 year love affair, I used a chisel and carefully worked my way around until things came apart. To mate the new transmission get a few threads connected on the nuts, then rotated the (flywheel?) pulley on the front of the motor to align the splines. With some tension from the connecting stud bolts on these you can hear a 'clunk' when it slides on. The motor should turn freely after this, and the nuts can be tightened. Driveshaft issues When the driveshaft is removed from the transmission, gear oil comes out. If the bracket that holds the center u-joint of the driveshaft to the body is removed, there is enough play with the angles to get the driveshaft disconnected from the transmission. The nuts and bolts that hold the driveshaft to the transmission aren't captive. The driveshaft lenghts are the same between the d/r and the pushbutton 4WD transmissions. These don't have to be swapped. Electrical The pushbutton switch on the shifter now has nothing to control. Mine had nothing to control to begin with since I fabricated a shifter arm when mine was binding up and wouldn't work with the vacuum actuator. A clean snip of the wires and plugs (sprinkler goof plugs) on the lines coming off the two solenoids on the driver side firewall will clean this up. One of the wires has 12v, so be careful to cover it. The 4WD light on my dash still works. The connector on the both transmissions is the same, so this is plug-n-play. The speedometer cable is plug-n-play as well. Mine is off from the big tires, so I can't say if they are calibrated the same. Shift linkage This was by far the hardest part, and has multiple problems introduced by the 3" lift. For the 5-speed part I had to bend a bracket to hold the hold the assembly that connects the shifter arm to the linkage to the unibody. It allows the bottom of the shifter arm to drop down about two inches and forward about one inch. With the mounting point for the base of the shifters moved down, the dual range lever wouldn't engage. I fabricated a new lever that attaches to an angle bracket on the right side of the 5-speed shifter. Modifications to the stock shaft that connects the shifter to the transmission are shown here. The body opening is actually below the pivot point, not below as shown. But even after making this fine assembly, it still had enough driver to passenger direction slop that it was banging against the driveshaft. Driving with the hole uncovered is a bit unnerving, but when this thing starts grinding against the driveshaft it'll scare ya. The bracket to constrain the side to side slop is shown below. These are just rough drawings showing how I got around the problem. I'm sure there are other ways to do this. If anybody wants to make an identical version of this let me know and I can update this with dimensions. I just used trial and errror to make this all fit and not bang together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MorganM Posted June 27, 2005 Share Posted June 27, 2005 You should submit this to the USRM above =) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diluded000 Posted June 27, 2005 Author Share Posted June 27, 2005 You should submit this to the USRM above =) I was going to, but couldn't figgure out how. And in the spirit of good science, I thought a peer review might be in order before that. Any comments would be welcome. - James B Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Numbchux Posted June 27, 2005 Share Posted June 27, 2005 I was going to, but couldn't figgure out how. And in the spirit of good science, I thought a peer review might be in order before that. Any comments would be welcome. - James B I found that in the 'site help/suggestions' forum, that they are not accepting new articles...readers rides, USRM, etc...until they update the software later this summer, but hang on to the article, awesome info. one question, was it an auto push button you were convertig from? I can't quite tell. I'll be taking on a project similar to this later this summer, taking the D/R 4wd driveline from my '85 GL wag, and putting it under my rust-free 3AT FWD '92 loyale....should be interesting, this info should come in very handy. NICE WORK!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
soobmater Posted June 27, 2005 Share Posted June 27, 2005 nice work that is a good write up. you will be able to put it in there as soon as they(the administration) update. that is some very useful info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diluded000 Posted June 27, 2005 Author Share Posted June 27, 2005 <snip>one question, was it an auto push button you were convertig from? I can't quite tell. I'll be taking on a project similar to this later this summer, taking the D/R 4wd driveline from my '85 GL wag, and putting it under my rust-free 3AT FWD '92 loyale....should be interesting, this info should come in very handy. NICE WORK!! Thanks for the input. Both were manual transmissions, I'll be sure and clarify that when I move it after this upgrade. - James B Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MilesFox Posted June 27, 2005 Share Posted June 27, 2005 i can save the article and put it up on my website, with your permission. i am looking for contributions in general Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diluded000 Posted June 27, 2005 Author Share Posted June 27, 2005 i can save the article and put it up on my website, with your permission. i am looking for contributions in general Thanks for asking, and feel free to cut/paste, etc. I mean, how could I say no - you have explosion pictures. - James B Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MilesFox Posted June 28, 2005 Share Posted June 28, 2005 yeah will do, i have lots of work yet to do with the website and moving to anotehr server. with an updated version Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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