A833 OD or 727 behind a 440. Suggestions and questions

Matt
with 255s, you'll never break anything in that box with the exception of the little od gear.
The Achilles heel is the very wide splits; .540 and .599, which only becomes so with a high-reving high-rpm-cammed engine. And really the 1-2 is the worst. So I wouldn't run it with something like a low-compression, small displacement engine with something like a 268 or bigger cam, unless it also has big rear gears.
I ran it with two engines and 4 cams and many rear gears, and the only way thru that 1-2 split, performance wise speaking, was with big rear gears so the engine could pull in second.
With a 340 or less cubes;about the smallest overall second gear you would want to run is 6.06 corrected to 24" tire as stated in post 16. That gives you something to play with.With 255/60-15s coming in at 27" tall, that would be 4.10s;( 4.10x1.67x12/13.5=6.086). These will get you 32mph@2720rpm, so your engine better have some power down there. An 8/1- 318 with a 268* cam won't pull that real briskly. In fact a 318 with a 268* won't pull that with hardly any Scr. So a downshift would be required and the the engine will be screaming at 5040..... for about a half of a second and then you just have to put it back into second,anyway. That is the Achilles heel,right there.
A high-torque 367 with something like that 268* cam and plenty of compression will muscle it's way outta that 2720 hole,but not with any authority. I ended up with 4.88s for a while but first gear was ridiculously useless, so I tried 4.30s. That put the Rs up to 32mph@2850, and my 367 was ok with that at 10.9Scr/185psi/aluminum heads/164VP.
I think a stroker would be happy with down to 3.91s, so long as it is well-engineered; ie; similar pressure and aluminum heads, will get you a VP about 13% higher, so you can run 13% less gear than the 4.30s, so I get 3.81s . With 3.91s you could cruze at 65=2300 in .73od If you already have 3.73s installed, I would try them. 65mph will be 2200rpm
If you decide 360 cubes then put aluminum heads on it and pump the pressure waaay up; I run 10.9Scr on 87E10@ from 175 to 185psi. 175psi is a cheap easy build. 185 requires a zero-deck to a little pop-up,so machining is required.

If you have traction issues, then ignore EVERYTHING i just said, and run whatever you want
BUT
Just remember that it's a 3+1 trans. When you hit third gear,
STOP!
Remember.
Gently put it into overdrive.