i have an 89 f250 2wheel drive 7.3 n/a and i have a 3 speed tranny with no overdrive its killin my mpg and i want to sawp for a better tranny i heard the e40d is ok but goes out a lot and i eard about gear vendor od but dnt know anything about them if you have some advice please let me know thanks guys

 

How much can you spend on this? What will the truck normally be used for?

I've done the E4OD swap and am happy with it, but it gets pricy if you want something thats at least as strong as the C6 that you already have.

Being a 2wd, a gear change to 3.08 would be the cheapest thing to do if you are not towing much.

 

thats the thing i wanna do it on a budget due to the economy.... it will tow not all the time but often as 2 times a month im really tryin to keep the tow capacity....but mainly its my dd and 65 on the freeway at 3500 rpm is killin me

 

filthy pride,
Welcome to FTE and the IDI diesel forum.


About any way you go, your budget will most likely be over 2000 dollars for parts unless you are very lucky.

Tranny must be from a diesel engine Ford truck Pre 2003.

Locally overdrive diesel transmissions are running 1500 or better.

 

The standard answer in the bumpside forum is to buy a 4 banger and drive your rig only on the weekends. I don't know your area or situation but in many areas you can buy a donor vehicle and junk what you dont use cheaper than you can get used parts. If you have a place to do it.

 

If you are not towing more than 5000lbs and don't need to push that trailer up steep grades over a curb, then 3.08s will still work for towing. Provided you can swap the gears yourself, you can be done for less than $300. If you can find a complete rear end thats already geared with 3.08s, then that would also work, but they are rare.

Swapping to an E4OD will cost a minimum of $1500 if you are VERY thrifty. Some guys with C6 transmissions opt for a swap to a 5 speed manual transmission instead. That could be done for around $500, but those can be hard to find for that price.

Nice thing about a gear swap is it means you can leave your drive shaft alone. However, looking at your cruise RPMs, you are likely have gears that are lower than 4.10, so that complicates matters even more. You can't drop to 3.08s in a case that was made for 4.11 gears or lower (numerically higher).