Not having 5th gear relegates a car to a local-only around town car. 5th gear in my car was super loud, so I never drove far. Never mind the constant little problems, the transmission has been the big issue.
Finding a W58 or R154 transmission is difficult, never mind an affordable one. Finally got one a few months back, and at last found some time to do the swap.
Three days of hard work in a heatwave really did me in! But the job is done at last.
Really not a lot of bolts actually, but the three at the top of the transmission are so hard to get to, I had to take a lot of other stuff off first.
You can see here the turbo elbow has been leaking. I think because the flange isn't flat. I put a second gasket in and that seems to have sealed up the leak. No more exhaust leak noise and soot on the turbo
Working on this surface with the car only 18" off the ground is terrible. I use a camping roll to keep the rocks from chewing me up too bad, but it's still hard work
Thanks to some help from my brother, the transmission is finally out! Old transmission with the longer shift housing at top is from a MKIII Supra non-turbo. Replacement W58 at bottom. Not sure what car it's from, hopefully it is actually a W58 or I got ripped off!
Replacement in at last. Very hard work for two guys to bench press the thing into place in such a small space under the car
New shifter further forward, and actually in the correct place for a Corona! Good thing I only cut and peeled back the metal underneath, so returning the trans tunnel to stock will be easy.
Need to change the angle of the shifter though, too close to the dash now.
Test drive didn't go well. Firstly, the new transmission is really noisy. Has me VERY worried. I realized though I put 75w80 Redline synthetic in, when Toyota calls for 75w90. Could that be why? Also, the brakes are doing this super annyoying thing where they gradually apply force as they warm up, until they are on and dragging fully, making the car un-driveable.
Hopefully this weekend I can fix the brakes and put the proper fluid in the gearbox and take a real test drive.