Transmission Reccomendations for 383 500hp

I've got a 383 putting out a little over 400 HP mated to an NV4500. Seems to do the trick.

You’ll love the 4500 man. Def the way to go and it’s night and day compared to the sm465 as far as smooth shifting and drivability. Now my 350 is stock but I love how the trans drives. I swapped the 4500 in when my nv3500 **** the bed.

Jesse_Wenting said:

a 4L60e can handle around 700 ponies

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lol

And the NV4500's 1st gear is great for rock crawling.

DerekTheGreat said:

'95 and up still have a granny type gear, especially if you've got 3.73's or higher. If you aren't going to drive it on the road, then the advantage of an NV4500 is probably moot. I drove our C3500 everywhere, top speed of 60mph was atrocious as well as the MPG. Held on to the truck for almost two years I think, spent much of that time looking for a '95 NV4500 as Richlo pointed out. Never found one so we sold the truck. I regret selling that thing.

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My old truck (the one in my pic) had stock gears and a stock motor, on 35 tires and a sm465 i could pull a 6 precent grade in 4th gear @ 70mph if my tank was below half and no passenger. If it was flat i was flyin. must have been the tires to that ratio gear but never really had a problem. I know nothing of ratios yet though.

94_Z71 said:

And the NV4500's 1st gear is great for rock crawling.

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As stated in the last reply i had the sm465 in my other truck and i loved it. I must be biased towards 4 speeds though. My first truck was an 81 f150 w/ a 4spd and i think that ruined me on transmissions. I learned how to 4 wheel in that thing and now granny gear is a must for my hobby truck. So whether or not i do a 4500, 465, or anything else it will have to have a low gear for my application.

I just had stock tires & wheels. I knew my ratios though, at 60mph, the thing was turning 26 or 2800 RPM, it was nuts. I did not want to wing any higher than that.

Don't get me wrong, I liked that granny gear, but the trans was not for me for daily use. If I need a low gear now, I just pull the fuse for 4WD, stab the transfer case in 4Lo and get myself 2Lo. A 5LM60 already has a pretty close to useless first ratio at 4.00:1, I usually start in 2nd.

DerekTheGreat said:

I just had stock tires & wheels. I knew my ratios though, at 60mph, the thing was turning 26 or 2800 RPM, it was nuts. I did not want to wing any higher than that.

Don't get me wrong, I liked that granny gear, but the trans was not for me for daily use. If I need a low gear now, I just pull the fuse for 4WD, stab the transfer case in 4Lo and get myself 2Lo. A 5LM60 already has a pretty close to useless first ratio at 4.00:1, I usually start in 2nd.

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If you get tired of pulling the fuse there is a kit that make front dif engagement manual instead of the thermal actuator, pretty damn nice to have

I've read about it.. I suppose if my thermal actuator ever gives me the fits I might do that, or just upgrade to the later style. The fuse is pretty simple though and I'm lazy.

Edit: Although maybe I'm not that lazy? I tore my interior apart and raided a vehicle in a treasure yard for it's defrost switch and associated wiring harness. Tinted rear window with defrost is now installed and added to my truck.

Hmm, I suppose laziness of not wanting to scrape the rear window motivated me to do the swap though. Chicken or the egg thing?

I've entertained the idea of adding the defrost to my truck. Is that harness pretty standalone or did you have to section it out?

MIHELA said:

I've entertained the idea of adding the defrost to my truck. Is that harness pretty standalone or did you have to section it out?

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It's a standalone deal surprisingly! Although maybe it isn't for '95 and up. But I played with the donor vehicle at the treasure yard and found the harness and pig tail going up to the switch on the dash goes from the convenience center up over the steering column and into the area just under the HVAC controls. For the '88 to '94 crowd the convenience center already has provisions for rear defrost whether you had it or not, so it plugs right in. Then you just have to run the purple wire through the plastic conduit along floor, up under the trim and through the cab right to about where it plugs into the window itself. The ground side simply used a self tapper to complete the circuit through the cab. I'm almost done wiring it up, can't wait to see if it actually works. I've never seen another regular cab truck with defrost but it'll be great to have when the weather is like this- no more misty window for me.