having had both in my cars, i hated the A833 and i'm a mopar guy. Muncie all the way....tho i threw a tremec 5speed in my 64 polara..it is truly slick.
I can't say for sure but while I've heard of drag racers putting hemi 4-speeds in Chevys, I ain't never heard of anybody lookin' to put a muncie in a Dodge or a Ford. Just sayin...
Don't know which one I would use, BUT I have driven a few examples of both and I've never found a 833 slower shifting. I think its all in the shifter mech. The 833 is by far the stronger of the two and cheaper to buy. However the Muncie is a lot lighter. A '71 up 833 has a closer ratio then a '69 and older, but I don't think its as close as a M21.
maybe mine was just needing to be rebuilt but that a833 wouldnt hold 1st or reverse on a hill (pop out of gear), and 3rd always took two tries to get it into gear. killed me at the strip. my muncie rockcrusher was really smooth and fast but i did twist the input shaft with too much HP.
I picked up a my6 a883 for my Bel Air...its got overdrive! I'm am not going to be banging gears in this boat, but still wanted a manual. Havent got the car on the road yet, so i dont know how its going to go.
I have just spent the better part of last week wrestling a 833 into a '64 dart with a V8... If somebody ever asks for your help doing this little slice of stupidity, pass! Heavy, that 833 probably indestructible though. My personal opinion - do exactly what WTFHemi said. Save your pennies and get a Tremac tko 600!!! That's what I did behind my small block, best money I have ever spent on anything - ever!
833 no question. The weakest part you can ever put in a Mopar is ANY chevy part. A Hurst Super Shifter 2 to mix up the gears on that thing and you won't talk about it being slower or harder than a Muncie...and you'll really appreciate it that it will likely never break.
Good call. Here is some good info on the almighty 833: http://www.bigblockdart.com/techpages/4sptech.shtml. There is also the 833 O/D but it is definitely not known for its strength. It is essentially a 3 speed with a 0.73:1 fourth gear, but I doubt it would hold up very long behind the 392.
For what it`s worth i had a healthy 340 in a Dodge PU with a A-833 OD in it.. Burnt rubber all day, and would bottom out the speedo all the way to zero again with ease.. That car scared me, and the trans was a very good one, lots of power and heavy car, never a trans issue ever..
As has already been said, there are various versions of the Mopar trans. A good one is stronger than even an M22 Muncie.
Since we're on the subject of Muncie's; is it possible to use a four speed and convert it to a column shift? Or is it floor shift only?
My '69 Z had a M-21 and it kicked ass... I also had a M-22 (yeah, the one with the drain plug) out of a '69 SS 396.. I sold that years ago for 400 clams.. I should have kept it..
The Muncie, Mopar, T-10, and Ford top loader are all side shift transmissions. That means with enough work it would be possible to do a column shift. I have never seen it done with any of the transmissions mentioned, but some older foreign cars had column shift 4-speed transmissions.
Cool! That is what got me to thinking about it. Saw an old Mercedes not too long ago with a four speed column shift. Thought it might be a good idea for my bomb Cheby.
Until relatively recently a lot of Japanese light trucks and minivans came out with column shifted four- and even five-speeds, and most of those 'boxes have integral top/remote shifters. That includes Toyota's W5* series, which is a useful five-speed for sub-300bhp applications.
I know a guy using the stock column shift in a 50 GMC truck hooked up to the Chevy version of an A833 OD 4 speed.He uses a separate lever under the dash or on the floor to engage reverse.He says it works very nice.
i had an a833 in my chevy for a while, it was free & all i had to get it running. mine was thoroughly thrashed, shifter was a guessing game 1/2 the time & the thing was noisey as hell. but that being said i wouldn't mind rebuilding it & getting a shifter for it to someday find it's way back into something. the thing is cheap (free in my case),bulletproof, & it's got an overdrive. the only gripe is the gear ratio spacing i suppose, but i'd live with that. especially if it was in a low geared car. my 2 cents
I'd keep it in the family and use the Mopar box. With a good shifter, you should be good to go. I've driven a few Road Runners and other similar cars with the 833 in it and they shifted fine. Bob
You gonna have enough power you won't need no speedshift. Just stick it in a gear, any gear, & let it wind out. Give that other guy a chance to recover while you're pickin out your next gear. I run a MY6, Chevy O.D. version of the 833 behind my inline 292. Use a Hurst shifter, it is nice to drive, good gear splits on the ratios.
I belive m21 muncies had a close ratio 2.21 1st gear. Fine to restore a original 60s trans am style race car. No low end and no top end either how is that good for driving ? Or if you want to be able to start out on a hill put 4.11 rear end gears in it & only kill the top end. A good m20 is the beter wide ratio tranny that works with 3.55 rear gears well. If it were mine I'd go with a 94 mustang t5 to keep it kinda ford and have a good gear selection. Or a mopar 4 speed to match mopar engine, I had two of them in the past, never a problem they are tough as nails, no problem shifting fast either. I'd probable use the one that bolts up easier and cheaper. If it is a smaller cab like 30 ford coupe you may want to go automatic. Unless you are limber and ah ah ah short .
Cool! So, where would I find one of these Toyota W5's? What year vehicles should I be on the look out for? Will it mount to a Six banger Chevy with relative ease or will I need an A-dapter kit/plate?
There was another thread on this recently. You'd need a column designed for a 4 or 5 speed trans (3 gates and levers). It CAN be done with a typical 3 speed column, but you will need a separate lever to operate reverse.
Those column shifters use a different method of changing gates than the usual 3 speed column. There was no "H" gate built into the column, and only one shift rod going to the transmission (you'd just have to see it). It would be pretty difficult to adapt that to a side shift toploader with 3 levers. If you're really determined, many 60s-70s "low-cab" International cab-over trucks used a column shifted 5 speed. Those might be easier to find in a truck boneyard than the Toyotas. They still don't have the gates built into the column, though...
An 833 can be built to shift any way you like it. Not sure the slow shifting is so much transmission as it is user. Don't get me wrong, I have two M22's and they are great behind 327's, but a Mopar trans should go behind a HEMI...period.
The Jalopy Journal
