Stangatic

I am not sure how we did it, but it did not take much force to do it. I was even able to torque it down to the proper torque specs too.

Maybe the trans is f ed up? or possibly the bell housing... this is what all the trans shops are telling me.

The person that I got it from "supposedly" used it behind a stout 351w. I honestly doubt that he ever used the transmission in the first place.

The trans sat in my basement for over a year before I even inspected it (my stupidity). When I inspected it, I noticed that at one point in time, something must have broke and shot between the bell housing and the trans case (TOB???) because there is a clear mark where something went wrong. Plus the clutch fork was welded together too. With my first engine, I thought the bell housing might have been bent because I had the same issue/ and I swapped the roller bearing thinking this could also be the issue. So, I got a new bell housing and a bronze bushing (what was standard in 1966). And everything went together fine.

HOWEVER, My engine was toasted because I had a 1/2" of movement the main bearings. (i.e. the crank moved in and out of the engine 1/2"). Maybe this is how we got it to fit now that I connect the dots.

Now that I have my new engine, I used a roller bearing forgetting about my previous mishap. Once I realized that the trans wasn't going in again, I figured there had to be more to the issue than roller bearing Vs bushing. Thus my posting and all the research I have done in the past week.

I just hope I didn't destroy my new engine by trying to get the trans to go in place. (there is no play in the crank what so ever) The dots have been connected and now I understand the issue...... What a mess I have gotten my self into.

I'm going to buy a T-5 today because of this issue, plus, when I had it behind my old engine, the trans liked to pop itself out of gear. This is what you get when you go the cheap route... a simple $25-- swap/ rehab of car has now ballooned to $7k.

The clutch setup is a hydraulic setup and can only depress the clutch when the trans has been bolted to the bell housing.

Stangatic

I just wanted to post an update to this thread to inform everyone of what I found the problem to be.

As AdderMK2 points out, I should not have been able to put the trans in a 1/4" if it was truly a 94-95 trans. Well, I was able to and it was because as I put the trans in, the inner bearing sleeve separated from the pilot bearing and slid back into the crank. Thus allowing the trans to go in further than what it should. I checked my old block and noticed that the bearing did the same exact thing.

**ford racing and other brands of roller pilot bearings are two pieces

So Lesson learned!

AdderMk2

glad I could help you sort it out