Full manual valve body forward pattern?

Any articular reason not wanting to use a Transgo kit? I see from another post you were having some issues with it, but you never mentioned status or findings. Something to consider is if you were to source a good unmodified valve body and swapped over the Transgo TF-3 kit, you can (save $$$!!!) wire back the kd lever, or let it operate with the throttle going all the way back at wot. Just switched from the TF-1 to the TF-3 on my 727, left the kd cable connected, can cruise around with nice quick shifts (not harsh or any crash boom banging at all) and a wot nothing but quick solid shifts as they should be. And, even though I won't, ithe TF-3 can be converted back to auto function like a TF-2.