I have a C6 automatic transmission on a 400 Ford Motor. I want to swap the current transmission to a 5 speed manual transmission. What kind of transmission should I get? What would I need to do to in addition in order to get the manual transmission? My truck is a Ford F-100 1976. I think the motor is not the original one.

 

I don't think a 5 speed ever came attached to the Ford 400, and all of the Ford 5-speeds (I believe) have integral bellhousings, so that becomes an issue. I can think of two possibilities.

One is to adapt a ZF5 trans from a 460 to your engine. Here is a link to a thread where a guy did that with a 351M (same block as your 400). Gary (the guy in that thread) isn't very active here anymore, but his thread is comprehensive, so it should help you out.

The other would be to get a 5 speed that doesn't have an integral bellhousing and a bellhousing for your 400 and try to marry them together. I put an NV3550 from a Jeep on the 302 in my Bronco using an adapter from Advance Adapters. I'd guess you could do something similar with either the NV3550 or with the stronger NV4500. But I'm just guessing there.

The only other thought I have for you is that you might get more help for your '76 from people more familiar with that generation. This forum is for '87 - '97 light trucks. You might want to check out the '76 - '79 forum (still on FTE, so your same login works for that forum too).


edit: I forgot about you saying you think the engine isn't original. Ford engines use a lot of different bolt patterns to attach the bellhousing. If you don't have a 400 then your choices will be different. So you do need to nail that down.

 

400 would not be original in a '76 truck. 351M/400 replaced the 360/390 FE motors starting in 1977.