Ditch the ball and trunnion

[salinasjoel]

Anybody have any experience with losing the ball and trunnion on an early a and replacing it with a standard yoke and universal joint setup? Can it be done fairly easily and will my current trans work with it? Right now it's all original 65 with a 273 and 904. Tried to google it and didn't find any info.

 

[replicaracer43]

In that situation, I would swap to a slip yoke 904, super easy

 

[salinasjoel]

So your saying swap the trans?

 

[scamp360]

I have read somewhere that you can make a driveshaft out of a modified front 4 wheel drive front driveshaft. The one from the transfer case to the front axle.

 

[grimreaper]

http://earlycuda.org/tech/ujoint.htm

 

[Supershafts]

The best option would be lose that trans, the next would be to convert the shaft

 

[eestatic]

The best option would be lose that trans, the next would be to convert the shaft

Why lose the Trans??

 

[Hyper_pak]

Slant six org has info on the drive shaft swap. Your trans is a cable shift unit. So if you want to change your shifter you can go with a later trans with the slip yoke. However crank changed in 67-68 so your converter must be a small register unit to fit your older crank. Just a couple of things to think about.

 

[Charrlie_S]

The easiest way is to have a driveshaft built, as per the earlier link. Any trans swap gets involved, and you still need a different shaft. The article linked to is my 66 Barracuda with a 65 trans.
A 65 904 is a cable shifted trans, so to use a 66 or 67 trans, you need to use a different shifter, and a later driveshaft, and a 66 speedo cable(if I remember correctly).

If you use a 68 or later trans, then you also need a custom torque converter, as the splines for the input shaft increased, but the later torque converter also had the size of the pilot nub that goes into the crank increased, also. This will not fit the 67 or older engines.

This pertains to both the slant six, and small blocks.

 

[Supershafts]

Why lose the Trans??

Because the trans needs a heavier shaft option to convert to, LOSING the old trans and getting a up to date trans will save you weight and give you more options to getting better performance than KEEPING that trans.

 

[cuda6867]

I did the swap on my 64 slant six wagon maybe three or four years ago and have had no problems, the link the grimreaper referred to was the one I used, I think the cost was about 200 bucks for the parts and labor of building the new shaft.

 

[cosgig]

Or you may be able to locate a late 65 B body small block trans, which still had the cable park mech but had a slip joint tail shaft! That's what I did when I wanted a slip joint in my 64 belvedere with a big block pushbutton. Just swapped the tail shaft from a trans I found in a 65 Coronet 273 car!!