200 metric tranny died

Hello all,

It has been a while since I have posted because I have been driving and enjoying my car. Anyways, after manually shifting it from low to drive for the past year and a half my "chili pepper" finally left me stranded. I knew it was going out when it started to drive normally just by putting it into D.

Its a 1977 caprice classic coupe. It has the 350 and q jet carb (which leaks) and stock tires. My question is should I pull the trigger on a 200 4r from bowtie overdrives? The tranny, converter, speedo gear, and wiring harness to lock the converter into 4th gear would set me back around 2 thousand dollars. I thought that I would more than make up for the upfront cost with the increased gas millage.

Also, I was was wondering what crossmember I will need. I think bowtie can sell me one but to be honest theirs looks a bit pricey and I wanted to get some opinions from you all before I go all in on this project.

Thanks

Oh by the way, I may want to duel the exhaust at some point so the crossmember would need to allow for that.

Thanks again.

Well first off, great choice, the 2004r is a good transmission, but before you swap it you need to know what rear end gear ratio you have, if its stock it probably has a 2.56 or 2.41 or something very low on that end. With that OD transmission your going to need at least a 3.08 so it wont bog the motor down and literally choke it to death. Once thats set, and if i remember correctly the 2004r shares the same crossmember bolt location as a th350, which you could have custom made for around $250 on average with dual humps for duals. I believe the driveshaft will need to be shortened and hopefully the slip yoke comes with the transmission since the th350 or the 200 you had will be different. Also the gear shift column isnt set up for a 4 speed, and this was the part i was wondering about when i was considering dropping in the same transmission. You always have the option for a floor shifter, i just dont think the factory steering column will work, unless you pull the whole column out of an 80's model that had a 4 speed. Another thing is the TV cable, those have to be adjusted perfectly or youll fry the tranny. After some thoughts and much planning i decided to keep my th350, id love to have an overdrive, but since its not a daily driver i dont really need it.
Also Art Carr from CPT also sells the 2004r's starting at $1499 for one that can handle up to 250hp http://www.cpttransmission.com/catalog.htm

Theres going to be alot of planning and considerations to do, but with the right stuff you can make it happen!

Thanks for the reply. I had no idea the steering column would not work. I don't want a floor shifter so I guess I'll be better off buying a th350. It should bolt right in correct? The only difference is I would need to run a tee off the brake booster to the modulator?

I dont think the steering column would work, i dont think theres enough room for the extra gear, unless the column could be torn apart and what ever stops the shifter from going down, just grind that part. That i dont know, ive never had the column torn apart to see how that works. But the th350 is much cheaper, and theres tons of them. Everything will cross over, and yeah just need a vacuum supply to the modulator and thats about it, it has a kickdown cable, but you dont have to use it. You can run a line straight from the intake manifold, thats where GM put them stock, try to leave the brake booster line alone as it needs all the vacuum it can get. My th350 is original from 79 and im very hard on it, i manual shift when i do drive it, it has just under 120,000 miles on it, ive only put in a bottle of lucas transmission conditioner and added a tranny cooler and shes still going strong. Ive been doing that for the past 4 years. Im going to put in a shift kit this summer and slowly change the fluid out. Speaking of fluid if you need to put fluid in, use Dexron 6 usually labeled VI. You can read a ton of interesting info on dex 6 if you google it.

Good to know about the dex 6. I never heard of it. One of the things I love about these cars is the cheap plentiful parts. So a turbo 350 would keep it simple and cheap. I will try to source one this weekend.

I just had to have that 4 speed dood, I posted a new thread in the project section. Going with the 700r4!