RX-7sol

I'm looking at picking up an 84 GS but its AT. I was wondering if a MT conversion is a simple bolt in or is there gonna be a lot of wiring to trick the car. All my previous 7s have been MT to begin with. haha Thanks for any and all help.

cfamilyfix

iTrader: (15)

No real wiring that I could think of...maybe the reverse switch. Other than that, switch out the radiator, do the pedals and hydraulics. You'll need to replace the flexplate with a flywheel, install a pilot bearing and seal. Not sure about the driveshaft. If you already have one from a 5speed 83-85, then it should work. A clutch kit and gearbox with shifter should complete the parts list. I think the manual trans mount is different too. Hope this helps. Good luck with it.

KansasCityREPU

iTrader: (9)

I just did this on my 1985 GSL. The following is for the 1984-1985:

Page 1-E11 of the FSM shows a brakeout of the clutch pedal. You will need the clutch and brake pedals along with the hardware. When taking the pedals out, you only need to take out the long bolt that holds it all together. Do not try to remove what I'll call "the box", it's too much work and not needed. You'll also need the clutch switch that part of the pedal assembly.

it's also a good idea to get the speedo. It's shorter in the MT vs Auto. You will need to fab up a trans connector. The MT cross member sites about 5-6 inches forward of the Auto.

1. Pedals from MT
2. Driveshaft from MT
3. MT from 1984/1985
4. Clutch slave and master
5. Clutch slave to mater hose
6. Fab up trans mount
7. Shift surround and boot
8. Speedo cable

Here is what I put togethjer for mine.

RX-7sol

thanks for the info . I guess I will continue to think about this the car is only $150 but the question is do I want to get into it. its a rolling chassis that's been sitting for a little while.

Man_in_black49464

iTrader: (1)

well for 150 the car is worth the parts you can sell on it, you could buy it and tear all the parts off and sell them on ebay you can get enough from selling the parts to buy a manual body. it just takes time.

rxtasy3

iTrader: (2)

no need to change out the rad.

Mr_Miles

iTrader: (1)

I know in my 71 scout II, to do a MT conversion, all you need is the standard MT items (clutch, linkage, etc) and the clutch pedal. Lol. That was easy. All bolt on. did it in a day.

I'm with Man_in_black, buy it and part it out and save the money to buy a MT car - you may make a few extra bucks and get a nicer car in the long run!

mazdaverx713b

iTrader: (91)

i've personally done teh swap and can tell you that its an easy task. there is a wiring difference for the starter trigger as it needs to see ground for the started to engage. much like a clutch start switch. i did a semi writeup awhile back with pics and some details. here it is:

ok, for those not familiar with my swap, please see this thread: https://www.rx7club.com/1st-generation-specific-1979-1985-18/auto-trans-manual-trans-swap-761003/

the swap has begun. i have all of the old auto stuff out. i have the manual trans pedals in, the auto shifter is completely removed, and the flywheel is on. today, i will install the clutch, trans, manual trans driveshaft, clutch master, reinstall the underbody heatshield, exhaust, and starter. i may as well throw a new set of plugs in the engine. as promised, i am documenting the swap with pictures. a few deviations from previous posters. i never had to cut the shifter to get it out. if you remove the bottom boot off of the plate, it exposes a throug bolt with a nut. remove the bolt and the shifter assembly can be removed from the bottom of the car. the metal plate then is removed from the top. i did not swap in a complete pedal box from a manual car. instead, i removed the auto brake pedal and installed a manual trans brake and clutch pedal in the existing frame. the auto and manual pedal frame's are identical. the only difference is the through bolt that the pedals pivot on. the manual bolt is longer to accomidate for the clutch pedal. it was pretty straight forward. its installed to factory spec. no one will ever be able to tell that there was ever an auto pedal assembly in there. so, today i will try and finish up. i will continue taking more pics and post them later tonight. stay tuned for further info. here are some pics of the progress thus far:



















and that maniacal auto shifter as seen from the bottom:

mazdaverx713b

iTrader: (91)

the mount that i used was the auto trans mount. the angle on the body mounts for the trans mount were different and therefore i could not use a manual trans crossmember. this worked out perfectly though. the mount extension was made, was made from 3/16" flat stock steel. we measured the necessary angles and raidused the steel for the proper fit, cut it, drilled some holes and it's tighter than a nun. fitment turned out excellent. here are some pics:

mazdaverx713b

iTrader: (91)

there were a couple of snags that i ran into. the first one was the top inspection plate for the flexplate/torque converter. this plate is bolted to the engine and to the trans. the auto dipstick tube bolts to this as well. the plate is larger than that on a manual trans car and cannot be used with the manual transmission. thus the plate must be removed. the next snag was the pedal assembly. i never removed the entire assembly. i simply pulled the auto brake pedal out and replaced it with a manual trans brake pedal and added the clutch pedal. there is a through bolt and a spacer that must be removed in order to remove the pedals. the auto through bolt is shorter because it does not have to accomidate the pivot for the clutch pedal. so, i used all of the components from the manual trans pedal assembly and bolted them into the auto's pedal box...which was identical once the brake pedal was removed.

the starter bolts are different. one must use the starter and bolts from a manual trans car. the starter wiring was a little rough at first. we figured out that we needed a trigger for the solenoid. the solenoid was getting power but because of the in car wiring, it needed to see neutral. so by wiring the BY wire to the BY wire that came off of the same connector initally, the soilenoid was then powered up, engaging the starter. here are a couple of pics:




the driveshaft length was different, which i knew from the start. the automatic trans driveshaft is shorter because the autobox is marginally longer. here is a pic of the two driveshafts. the auto driveshaft is on the top:


the intereior turned out nice. the snag i had was removing the auto shifter's mounting plate and boot. i had to completely disassemble the shifter from the bottom. once the shifter was out, i was able to remove the black boot under the metal mounting plate. after the boot was out, i was able to remove the mounting plate from the top. i then used the manual trans mounting plate and proper boot.


although dirty from the swap, the interior fits perfectly to the manual trans:


all in all it wasnt that difficult. the car runs and drives excellent. the trans has a tiny amount of bearing noise. the sucker has been sitting for 10 years so i'm hoping that i can use a better fluid (redline or synchromesh) and take away a little bit of the noise. other than that it shifts perfectly and drives so much better than when it had the autobox in it.

mazdaverx713b

iTrader: (91)

i have found that the list of parts you will need are as follows:

-manual trans and shifter
-mt driveshaft
-clutch and brake pedals from the applicable series (clutch and brake pedals are removable and as KansasCityREPU said, there is no need to pull the complete pedal box, you can just swap the manual trans cltuch and brake pedals in)
-correct year flywheel for the engine you are using
-custom trans mount/brace
-custom starter wiring
-clutch slave cylinder
-clutch hose
-clutch hard line
-clutch hard line bracket and clip
-clutch master cylinder
-mt lower and upper shift boots
-mt shift ****
-mt speedo cable (the auto will work its just a little long)
-mt shift boot and surround

Zentar44_ed

iTrader: (1)

I did this, its pretty easy...but for the trans mount bracket extension i made an bracket with wide-channel though...

Siraniko

iTrader: (13)

For me, the hardest part is swapping the clutch/brake pedal assembly. not easy for those who hasnt taken any Yoga class