I have a 1977 Ford F150 2WD pickup with a 351Modified engine and unfortunately the transmission has given up in me, as well as the bellhousing being cracked,.
Anyways, I am looking to my wonderful friendly ford drivers to tell me where the best & of course cheapest place on the net to order on is?

Adam Lipps
Kingsport, Tennessee

 

I've seen them on Ebay for around $350 + core charge...

 

A word of caution. If you buy local or off the net you might not get the "truck" components in the C-6.
In other words, they came in everything from very light to very heavy vehicles and internal components varied.

 

Im in need of one too. What do you mean by "truck" parts. I had a rebuild kit put in mine but the guy at school didn't do it right. Now i got it in the shop and their telling me $650. $450 if i can bring them one. This is in a four wheel drive truck so he could have used the wrong clutches in it or something (fiber or steels).

As it sits now there is a black residue on the bottom of the pan and from what they say the clutches are scored. Plus there is alot of fluid coming out the front of the pump housing. Im temped to tell them scrap it and just make up the $800 I paid for it in parts. The engine had been reworked too so thats what made the price seem worth it. Im deeper in the hole than I thought.

 

Some of the transmissions on eBay come from regular rebuilders and you can order them specifically for your vehicle application.

It sounds like you are out the core charge due to the crack. That would not be accepted by a rebuilder.

Parts stores can get rebuilt units also.

 

The whole reason for me needing a transmission is that is began leaking fluid up to the point that the transmission began slipping, well when I added fluid the problem seemed to quit, well evidently I wasn't paying enough attention to the fluid level and it run dry, well a few days later I added quite a bit of fluid and the truck wouldn't move, but yet I had reverse as if nothing was wrong, which before I pulled the transmission I attempted to adjust the low and reverse band and still yet, no forward gears, but reverse was fine, anyways I have pulled the transmission and the bell housing where it bolts up to the block had a big crack in it, but when I pulled the tranny there was no noticable place where it could have been leaking from, so I never really found out where my problem was coming from, so I figured the best thing to do was get a rebuilt transmission, what do you all think happened or where is the most common place for a C6 to leak, I looked at both seals, nothing seemed to be leaking, now when the transmission was in the truck it seemed to be leaking somewhere from the top in the front of the case, then it would spray back towards the rest of the underbody, anyways what instances have you all had happen?

Adam Lipps
Kingsport ,Tennessee

 

I once found out the hard way that a local well respected tranny shop had just "grabbed one off the shelf" when I had mine rebuilt. They didn't say anything about it but it didn't last long. When we tore it down it had a small number of cheap clutch plates, 2 gear planetary instead of three and a couple of other light duty parts.

 

did you notice any dark smoke coming out of the exhaust. or trannyfluid coming out the vacuum moduator hose. i had this problem before with my engine burning tranny fluid and fouling up my plugs really bad. as it says it is a vacuum modulator so it works off vacuum. if the modulator is bad, the engine will suck fluid into the intake and into the cylinders and get burned. So
you could have burned off some fluid.

 

but would all the fluid leak out during that process, and would I still have reverse gear, and no forward gears, I would add fluid to the tranny and overnight it seemed to drain out, but I couldn't seem to pinpoint where it was coming from, although I didn't check the modulator, what exactly happens when one of those does go bad?

 

Due to a lack of fluid you lost pressure in your hydraulic control systems. This caused the forward direct clutch and other parts to slip and wear out quickly. Reverse uses a different clutch.

 

so what do I need to do about this problem, is a rebuilt tranny the only option, although I need to make note that the bellhousing has a gap at the top evidently where somebody cracked it before, but this problem wasn't there when I first got the truck about 4 months ago, it started after about 2 1/2 months of use, wonder where the leaking was from then?

 

The only way to find the leak is to eyeball everything. A rebuilt tranny built to your application specs is your only good option. With Junkyard trannys you may end up trying to use some transmission for a 302 in a car which won't work behind a built 351W in a truck...

In your case only the transmission that is supposed to be behind a 351M or 400 in a truck would be a good choice. A 460 unit would not shift right.

There are many little tweak points in a tranny where they put different springs, valves, orifices, modulators, different #'s of clutch plates etc in order to make the tranny fit the aplication.

Your case is cracked so I would not use that trans as a core for a rebuild. If a trans shop knows what they are doing they can swap case parts etc.


Is this just confusing you?

 

yeah this is all pretty much confusing because it all happened at once, but ultimately the best option, like you said is to get a rebuilt spec'd to my truck, my mom works part-time at advance auto parts and they usually have very good service, so I think I will check with them, what do you all think, anyways changing a tranny in gravel with the truck up on car ramps is very aggrivating, you know

 

Well it didn't happen all at once. You were pouring fluid in for a while. If there was no external fluid leakage it was probably being sucked in thru a bad modulator valve, a $5-10 fix if it would have been performed. Changing a tranny out is no fun anytime anywhere.

-Sorry

 

ok I guess I need to go and look at some of the replies again. My understanding of this is that the problem may have only been a modulator valve, I don't know if I have already asked this question or not but if the modulator valve went bad would the truck still have reverse, and no forward gears, and another question is should I put the tranny back in and try the modulator valve or by it going bad, and me continously running it did I damage the transmission? What do I need to do, also I apologize for asking so many different questions and some even seemingly the same, right now I am concentrating on 3 things at once, doesn't that always make a person scatter-brained, LoL.