Technical T-10 Transmission repair options

I have been driving a 64 ranchero I recently acquired , 260 v8 with a Borg warner t10. it is 50+ years old has lots of miles, hard to down shift and jumps out of second. bearings were replaced about 10 years ago , but now I imagine it is going to need syncro's and and possibly some gears. I have looked at other options like a t-5 and 302 with the s10 tail shaft , but would really likc to keep the character of the 260 4 speed and maybe later install a gear vendor or some type of over drive. thought maybe a richmond gear 5 speed might be an option but it doesn't appear that I could mount the shifter in the original location. I see rebuild kits for the ford t-10's but no new hard parts. would a top loader be a better bet ? a extra gear would be nice, but I usually just cruise the speed limit and the 260 buzzes along just fine.

 

Go with the T-5.

I had a t10 in the Galaxie and it is a much more enjoyable ride with the T-5.

 

I didn't have to deal with the 5 bolt bell housing bolt pattern though. Not sure how to deal with that one.

 

The popping out of second on deceleration is extremely common to the early T10s, and 'fixing' it will cost more than the transmission is worth. Rebuild kits are relatively cheap, and going through the OEM linkage and cleaning/adjusting it can work wonders. One issue you'll have with a swap is the 260 is a 5-bolt block, uses a specific bellhousing only, and the trans pattern is '64-back only, so most common adaptors/transmissions for the later motors won't fit. And the shifter location will be an issue; the Falcon/Comet 4-speed mounted the shifter as far forward as possible, and almost any other choice will require butchering the floor pretty seriously. If you have a bench-seat car, the shifter will be under the seat.

You can get the Tremec with a extra-cost forward-mount shifter that will fit, but I don't think the bellhousing mount pattern will work.

 

Often over looked, the engagement teeth on that given gear and it's slider. you can put all the syncro's you want, it won't fix the problem. I'm willing to bet if the OP changed those two part's only, his trans will be good again.

 

On the early T10s, this was a design flaw. Replacing with like parts can cure it, but only for a short while. BW addressed this in the Super T10 by redesigning the cut of the syncro teeth with a 'backcut' so once engaged, they 'locked' together. This backcut was done on both the slider and the driven gear, you need the full 'set' for it to work. Supposedly, the ST10 parts will fit the early case (or at least at one time BW offered the upgraded style parts for the early boxes) but the cost of all four gears plus two new complete synchronizer assemblies was more than buying a whole new trans....