I just spent 11 hours working on trying to get the ZF into my truck in place of the old T-19. WHAT A PAIN IN THE $%&*@!

The T-19 came out fairly easily. I pulled the t-case off the tranny, then the tranny off the bellhousing, and then pulled the bellhousing off the engine. Since the case is one piece on the ZF, reversing that process isn't an option.

The problem is that the ear for the upper PS bellhousing bolt is hitting the 3" exhaust downtube from the turbo. Used a tranny jack and tried to get it to go up in there nose up, nose down, cocked sideways, on center, off center, engine tilted forward, engine tilited back - and every combination I could think of trying to get that ear past the pipe so that the tranny would fit up into the tunnel - and still no go.

Finally about 8 PM I got the bright idea to try raising the body a couple of inches. removed the bolts from the two cab mounts at the radiator and the two just behind the front wheels. Put a floor jack & wood block under the radiator support and jacked the front of the cab up 3-4 inches. Then using a prybar between the frame and the floorpan I lifted it up and put a 3" block on top of the frame on both sides.

By that point it was getting to be a little after 9 PM and too dark to see what I was doing under there, so I knocked off for the day. Tomorrow morning I'll hit it again bright and early. Might have to unbolt the exhaust pipe from the turbo. Now that I have enough room between it and the tunnel to be able to move it around I should be able to get the tranny back up in there now....

 

Sounds like you're having as much fun as I did putting my E4OD in. Hopefully it will be woth it ( for both of us ).

I noticed the starter caused some of the problem with mine, forcing me to push the trans up before I could slide it forward to the engine, It might be worth pulling it in your case. Have fun.

 

The exhaust on the ATS turbo is just a slip fit so it slid off nicely. The ATS directions say to grind off a tab on the bellhousing on the pass. side to clear the exhaust. Might want to check it out. http://www.atsdiesel.com/ATSWebsite/...rbosystems.asp It shows it on #5, 088 system layout. Did you change the floorpan for the shifter? The '87 ups are punched up taller in the rear.

 

Yeah, not on the Banks - up pipe and down pipe are both bolted on

I spotted that right away, and remebered having read about it. Cut it off early on.

Huh? Everything I've read says that you only have to modify the removeable part? I have it off already, so that shouldn't be an issue, and I plan on modifying it before putting it back on. If there is some more modification required that I don't know about, please clarify....

 

Yeah, the removable part. I had ones from a '84 t-19, '86 auto and a '90 5-speed. All three were different shapes. I used the one from the '90 as there was more clearance from pan to trans. I think the zf is taller behind the shifter. You could correct me on that one though if I am wrong. Had to modify for the t-case lever though. The '87 ups came though the floor itself, while ours goes though that removable pan. I had to replicate that hole in the newer pan.

 

when i pulled the ZF out of my 88, i had to remove the downpipe. it really ain't that hard to do if the exhaust is separated from the downpipe. 6 bolts. the hard part is getting the first bolt started when you put it back together. it took me the better part of 1/2 hour to get the first bolt started, then less than 10 minutes to get the rest in and tightened up.

 

Well, I got up a little late and a little slow this morning. My wrench-fest yesterday left me with sore muscles in places I didn't know I still had muscles. This stuff ain't as easy now as it was 25 years ago when I was only 20...

I decided that since I already had the body lift 2/3 done I might as well get what I needed to make it permanent. So I started my day out by running around getting some small miscellaneous parts - including a dozen hocky pucks for the body lift.

When I finally got down to business the first thing I did was try to remove the exhaust downpipe from the turbo. Its held in place by six 1/2" bolts - shouldn't be too tough, right? WRONG! I started cranking s-l-o-w-l-y on the first one and instead of loosening up I could feel it starting to yield - as in twist off! At that point I decided that maybe this wasn't such a great plan after all.

So I decided to pull the intake assembly off so I could see what else there was holding the turbo in place. A little poking around and I discovered that the pedistal the turbo is mounted on ends in a bracket that bolts to the back side of the passenger-side head. Pulled out the three 9/16" bolts holding the bracket to the head and VIOLA' - the turbo and exhaust pipe lifted up and towards the passenger side out of the way of the bellhousing. SUCCESS!

Once the exhaust pipe was far enough up to let the bellhousing line up it was just your typical wrestling match to get the tranny mated back up with the engine and bolted into place. The next challenge was getting the exhaust-to-turbo up-pipe back on. Took a while but after a little contortionism I finally got both bolts started. Keep in mind that the cab is still jacked up about 3" at this point. I don't think it would be possible to reach up in there to do it with the body in its normal position. At this point I'd been wrenching for four or five hours.

Next came the tranny crossmember. Since the tranny mount on the ZF is only an inch further back than on the T-19 I expected that the T-19 crossmember would work without any modifications. WRONG! Even with the crossmember slid as far back as it would go, the tranny mount bolts on the ZF just missed the back edge of the crossmember. I noticed that the bottom side of the frame already had a mounting hole drilled a little over an inch farther back than the one for the T-19. So all I had to do was drill two 1/2" holes in the top side of the frame on each side to be able to move the braces for the crossmember back an equal amount.

Once I got the crossmember mounted in the new holes and the tranny sitting on the crossmember I decided that 6 hours worth of wrenching was enough for today. From here on out it should all be gravy - just bolting all the pieces back together.

 

Yeah, I noticed that the stick for the t-case from the ZF wasn't going to work. Looks like the one from the T-19 will fit right on the ZF though, so I can still have the stick come up through the pan instead of the floor. Looking at the pan I think I can make a couple of relief cuts with my grinder and cutting disk, push the back part of the pan sheetmetal up to clear the "hump" the ZF has behind the shifter, then close up the holes with some pop rivets and sheetmetal.

That was my original plan - until I tried it. When I started trying to loosen the first of those six bolts I could feel it start to yield - as in twist off - instead of breaking loose. Rusted in place pretty bad I'm afraid. Unbolting the pedistal bracket from the back side of the passenger head and lifting the entire turbo was the solution in my case.

Hey Dave S, thought you might be interested to know that someone at Gale Banks Engineering attended the same school of forklift-assisted exhaust design as the guys that designed the factory ATS setup. Instead of mashing the exhaust downpipe pipe FROM the turbo flat (like the ATS guys) the Banks designers mashed the exhaust up-pipe TO the turbo flat instead.....

 

Well, I got a late start and had to knock off early today, but I made some progress.

Finished bolting the crossmember in and the tranny to the crossmember.

Got the the t-case installed and the shifter and linkage all hooked up.

Got the exhaust Y-pipe and up-pipe almost re-installed before I had to call it a day. That thing is a real royal pain in the you-know-what to get aligned and hooked up.....

 

Remember the old saying of no pain no gain.

 

Well if the gain is proportional to the pain, this is going to be the mother of all upgrades!

The process has sure been a mother

 

ROFLMAO. I ran the numbers through a couple formulas I have and the RPM drop alone looks promising to me. If you're runnng 3.55s like I am you'll drop down about 1000 RPM at 75 MPH. Just the increase in engine life would worth the upgrade. Plus from my rough figures it looks like you'll gain about 4-5 MPG

 

He has 4.10 gears, so 2300 RPM that now puts him at 53 MPH with the T 19 will be putting him at 70 MPH with the ZF 5.

A ZF 5 with 3.55 gears and 33" tires would top out at 120 MPH at 3300 RPM.
1950 RPM would be 71 MPH.

 

4.10 gearset with a ZF trans and 35 inch tires gives you 89 mph with a 7.3 at 3300rpm.

and the only thing that got me out of the speeding ticket is that i was the slowest vehicle on I 85 north outside of Durham North Carolina on thanksgiving day 1989.

 

Thank you both for the info. I didn't know how his truck was setup. I did the calculations based on my truck. I know I'm going to live with my T-19 till I get to Texas then wait till I accumulate enough funds to do the swap or go complete masochistic and install a 6-speed.