I want the overdrives

oldopelguy wrote: If you hook up your current column shifter to the 1-2 and 3-4 arms on a 4-speed the reverse arm on the transmission could be operated by another lever/pedal/knob via a cable. It would be weird, but in actual use maybe not so bad, rowing the column for forward gears then tossing the column in neutral and push/pulling on another control for reverse.

It won't be that weird. T56's are set up with a reverse solenoid that is supposed to be activated by an ECM. The car I'm swapping one into doesn't have an ECM, so I will probably end up having a button you have to push to get the car into reverse - and that is on a car WITH a floor shifter.

I was wondering if we could just do an "up switch" and a "down switch" in the column and a "reverse switch" with a few solenoids to do all the sifting :)

Good project of an Arduino?

In reply to Hungary Bill:

End result would be like a Toyota Camry electronic throttle, on your shifter.

In reply to Hungary Bill:

Possible in theory, tricky in practice. Think about the actual motion of doing a 2-3 shift: up - over a smidge - up some more. Figure on a lot of sensors and PLC programming.

But it's definitely possible - some years ago, a MINI tuner (M7) built/sold a kit that sort of made a MINI with sequential shifting. It worked kinda weird and still required operating the clutch, but it did work. It cost something like $3000.

No way do I have the time or patience to ever do a "solenoid operated T56", but it would be cool as hell though if it worked right.

The shop in Vancouver, WA got back to me. They have no overdrive units to install on my 3-speed. Bummer

I'll probably just order the whole transmission from car-part when I get a bit of free cash. Stuff it underneath and go from there.

In driving around town yesterday 2.73 gears probably wouldn't hurt as everything seems geared pretty "low" but I can always add the new rear ratio after I get the overdrive if I wanted (shoot, it'd idle at 60mph!)