I have a 91 Tracker that is getting tired, I have a chance to pick up the motor, tranny and case from a 94 with low miles for a good price. The 94 is an auto tho, I'm curious what people think of the auto that have run it or know of someone that does. My truck is my daily driver and I use it offroad about 25% of the time. When I do go offroad tho I like to play fairly hard but nothing too crazy. Thanks in advance for your opinions.

I have a 91 Tracker that is getting tired, I have a chance to pick up the motor, tranny and case from a 94 with low miles for a good price. The 94 is an auto tho, I'm curious what people think of the auto that have run it or know of someone that does. My truck is my daily driver and I use it offroad about 25% of the time. When I do go offroad tho I like to play fairly hard but nothing too crazy. Thanks in advance for your opinions.

If you're not too interested in the Auto. Just change over the flywheel and clutch from your old 8 valve to your new 8 valve and keep the manual transmission. It's all the same...

FWIW Ol' Hagen has told me that in his circle of Sidekick wheelers the 3-speed automatics have not held up well.

-Eric

my girl has an auto vitara which is modded for off road and we have had to change the bellhousing as the last one was fractured  .... all over  :-/

mind you i bought her a stock samurai and some mud tyres and this is the way she drives them, so it could be that as well  

The 3 speed autos leak and die under mild off road abuse. One guy in our club went through several of them in just 20,000 miles.  

Mike

I've had no problems with mine but I've never abused it either. 100,000+ miles with just regular maintenance, fluid and filter takes about 15 minutes to do.

honeslty i think the autos  hold up pretty well...i beat on mine and ive had no problems wit it so far...its been through allot water , snow, dirt and mud and now probs wit regular maintaing of it.

260,000 miles, never been out of the truck,
I couldn't be more impressed with my auto.

I do think tall tires and stock gears will kill
the trans tho, I also added an external cooler
since the turbo install.

A set of 4:1 TC gears would help the life too
less clutch pack stress, BTW I put a bottle of
slick50 auto trans treatment in when the trucklet
only had 60K miles or so, but only once, could this
have helped for all these miles???  also it leaks
fluid on a regular basis, might be the new fluid it
gets all the time never allows the trans fluid to
get dirty.    my 2 Cents Worth

Darrin

The 3 speed autos leak and die under mild off road abuse. One guy in our club went through several of them in just 20,000 miles.  

Mike

The 3spd auto is a Chevette tranny, and if properly maintained, will last a long time.  Believe it or not, there are perfromance shift kits available for the Chevette tranny.  Add a tranny cooler for wheeling, very important, to make it last longer.

There are a few guys out here with autos in both Kicks and Sammys, and all find them tops.  For slow rockcrawling, you can't beat an auto.  Less pilot input to fly the plane means better pilot concentration for the task at hand.

I plan on an auto in my Sammy, with the Kick t-case being the underdrive.  Just got to get it off the shop floor and into the truck.  Unfortunately, I have neither the time nor motivation to do it.

Two words "Heat Kills!!".

If you can keep it cool most auto's will hold up unless you break something.  It's the heat that causes the fluid to break down, melt seals and lets clutch plates slip and burn.  Then you have one fried trany.

A friend of mine is thinking of an auto and we talked that an A/C condencer would make a great auto cooler.  It's large and has great heat reduction.  Of cource he doesn't have A/C.

Yea, heat kills, but he tore the guts out of several torque converters. Busted! Thats just flat out not tough enough. Now I will say we pound these things pretty hard but he wasnt able to keep that 3 speed togather. Under different conditions, terrain, or drivers mabey this wouldnt be a factor. Id say if he wanted to keep up, he had to drive the way we did.

Mike

Thanks very much for your opinions guys. I'm in a bit of a quandry, the motor I can get is a 16v so I'm not sure if the flywheel will fit for one. The other problem is that I have recently started to hear an intermittent metal on metal squeal that appears to come from the tranny in 3rd and 4th. It stops if I push the clutch or shift but has  happened 3 times in the last week. I would like to keep the standard but money talks and the price seems right.
I know a couple of you have had standards go bad, does this sound like what your trannies did?

if your old one is an 8 valve then you will need to change the ecu and the front half of the loom as well
stick with the 8 valves
mines had loads of abuse and stands up great to it... stay away from auto transmission on vits though  

Thanks very much for your opinions guys. I'm in a bit of a quandry, the motor I can get is a 16v so I'm not sure if the flywheel will fit for one. The other problem is that I have recently started to hear an intermittent metal on metal squeal that appears to come from the tranny in 3rd and 4th. It stops if I push the clutch or shift but has  happened 3 times in the last week. I would like to keep the standard but money talks and the price seems right.
I know a couple of you have had standards go bad, does this sound like what your trannies did?

Yea it sounds like a bad bearing in the trans.

Mike

Give it to me straight doc, how long do I have  
Is it expensive to rebuild a tranny or is it not worth it on a high mile trans. On the lighter side I picked up a complete power steering system for 75 canuck dollars   me very happy about that.

I guess that would depend on how much you can find a low mile'd trans for?

Mike