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Posted by Tom in Indiana [32.165.240.231] on Saturday, May 19, 2012 at 06:23:27 :
I decided to spend a day at the junkyard Wednesday, while the weather was good and my wife was at work. The goal was to locate a Dodge NP435 for my '50 "FFPW" small block transplant. I already have a dual-window '90 NP435, so worst-case scenario was that I'd have to swap internals out of an older, 10-spline tranny into the newer case in order to use my winch. With that in mind, I spent five hours looking in, under, between, and on top of every possible place one might be. I ended up finding eight Fjord ones, and two Dodge... I think.
I checked the numbers on all of the ones that were out of vehicles and stored somewhere. They were all FoMoCo NP435s. Crap. I found a '69 D200 with one, but it's mechanical linkage, and I've been taking it that I need the hydraulic clutch kind. Double crap. On my way out, I spot two old, BIG Dodges. Both are D600s, white, covered in foliage. I hadn't gotten covered in ticks or poison ivy yet, so I was still optimistic and in a good enough mood to take a look. Hood one, up. Poly 318, hydraulic slave cylinder, four-speed shift pattern, and the top shifter plate is aluminum. Alrighty. On the back of the trans, I notice a drum-type brake setup. Weird. I can't be for sure I can use this one, so I go to truck #2. Hmm... 413. I can't get into the truck to see what the shift pattern is. The transmission has a drain plug on the driver's side bottom, and isn't flat like the NP435s I've seen. It doesn't resemble an NP540, either. I have no idea what I'm looking at, so I take a picture and save it for later analysis. Final tally= The transmission I THINK I can use is $200, if I yank it out. Fair enough. I head home, planning on doing some research.
Since then, I am more confused than ever about those two transmissions. The one that looks different, I have absolutely no clue what it could be. Both trucks are D600s, from between '61 and '64, as far as I can tell. Ray states that I need one from a '65-'68 truck. If Dodge started using them in '61, what is the non-compatibility with the '61-64 trannies? If I strike out on these two trucks, I'm at a total loss; there are NO other chances of finding one locally, and not one person has got one on Craigslist, anywhere. Does anyone know what I saw there? If I've found a transmission, it's going home with me next weekend. If not, I'm taking up drinking again.
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