- This is our brand spanking
new E36 off-road rally project. And unfortunately, we got
an automatic transmission at the moment. So today, we're gonna
swap out this automatic for the more desirable
manual transmission. And along the way, we'll
find out whether or not it's worth all the time,
effort, and money it takes. I think it's gonna be. Well I'm Zach, this is Money
Pit, let's get shiftin'. (upbeat music) Thanks to eBay motors for sponsoring this new season of Money Pit. Did you know, eBay motors
is one of the only websites where you can actually buy a car and all the parts you need? Facts. Take this transmission for example. All we had to do was enter
in the vehicle's info and boom, like magic. We found the exact part we needed. And you can trust that it's
the exact part you need because eBay has this proprietary
web feature called Fitment which guarantees any part you order fits the car you're searching for. So don't waste your time online,
get exactly what you need by going to the link in
the description below. Now, let's get back to
our newest money pit. All right, if you guys
have been sticking with us the past couple of weeks, you already know about this car. We got an E36 and we're
gonna be modifying it to be an off-road rally car. And I'm super excited about it. Now, of course, you can just
drive a stock car off-road to some degree of success, but
we want to go a step further. And last week we took
this out to the desert and drove it around pretty hard. And one of the first things
that was apparent was that this automatic transmission
is a bit of a hindrance. It doesn't really do
what you want it to do when you want it to do it. And in terms of a competitive
setting or a racing setting, like, you know, rally racing, you want to be able to put the
power down when you want it, where you want it, how you want it. And that's what you can do
with the manual transmission. And that kind of begs
the question why we even bought an automatic
car in the first place. Am I just hard up for episodes? Well, no, not really. The fact is that the E36
market is insane these days and it's hard to find a five-speed example for a decent price that
hasn't been absolutely abused. So, if you want to pay not an
arm and a leg and get an E36 that hasn't necessarily been abused, well you're kind of looking
at automatic cars these days. So if I've convinced you
that an automatic E36 is a good way to get into an
E36 or really any project car, as long as you can then swap
it to a manual transmission, well, you might be wondering
how do you go about swapping it to a manual transmission? What do you need? Well, you need this stuff. Obviously you're gonna need
a manual transmission itself but that's just the start of it. Then you need a way to
couple it to the engine and an automatic transmission doesn't use a clutch and flywheel like a manual transmission. So you'll need a clutch and flywheel. You're also gonna need
the proper mounting stuff for your manual transmission. So we've got our transmission mount with some poly bushings. Then you're also gonna need
your clutch hydraulic system. The master, the slave, and the pedal. And the lines that go in
between to connect all that. You know, the thing that
actuates your clutch, the actual hydraulic action
that you impose with your foot. So we've got all that stuff. Then you'll also need a
new drive shaft to connect your new manual transmission to your diff. Usually the length of
the manual transmission is different than the
automatic, often shorter. So your drive shaft will
ultimately be longer. Then you need all the shifting components so you can actually
row through your gears. And you know, depending on your platform, you'll need other little odds and ends, little pieces of hardware, little bushings, that kind of thing. And there's plenty of that on the E36. We'll go through each of
those things as we install. But this is the meat and potatoes of it. These are the big parts,
and this is pretty much what you'll need for any
manual transmission swap. The trans itself, the clutch and flywheel, the mounting stuff, the shifter stuff, the drive shaft, and the pedal set. So let's see if that proves to be true or if I'm forgetting anything. I hope I'm not. (deep techno music) All right, so the first thing I'm gonna do to get started on this project is actually take apart the interior while I'm still good and clean. So this whole shifter area
is gonna need to come apart. The center console needs to come out and I figured I might as well do that while the hands are still not so grimy. So we'll start in here, then we'll get the car up off
the ground and go underneath. (lo-fi music) We are officially done with this piece. And that makes me feel nice. Oh, wow. This stuff doesn't come
out quite as easily as it does on a Miata, but it is out. And now we're down to our ugly
automatic shifting mechanism. All right, so we've got
the whole automatic shifter and about half of the dash out. So that's gonna be pretty
much all the meticulous work, all the tedious stuff. And from here on out,
it's pretty much just scooping out elbow grease
and smearing it all over. So that's what we're about to do. I'm gonna get this thing
nice and tall on jack stands and then we'll go to work getting the automatic transmission
itself outta here. Now this part of the job
is never very much fun and it's easy to kind of get complacent but you're gonna be getting
under this thing a lot once it's up in the air. So don't get complacent, pay
attention to how you do this or else you could kill yourself. (lo-fi music) All right, well now we
got the car up in the air as you can tell, because I'm under it. So now it's time to start getting that automatic transmission out. So we've got to get some
stuff out of the way. First thing I'm gonna
do is pull this brace then get the exhaust off. Then some heat shield, then the drive shaft. And then we're getting close to actually touching the transmission. You know, I meant to do this first thing when I jacked the car up, but at least I remember before - - [Eddie] You spill it everywhere. - Yeah, I don't even
know if these spill out with the way the output
of the transit is but I want to find out the hard way. All These automatic cars also have an automatic transmission cooler. So that is an additional thing
that I'll have to remove. Probably no big deal. I can see the lines right here. Got to go though. Got to go. So look out for a transmission cooler. All right, so now I am
gonna take inventory of all the bell housing bolts I can see. So I can kind of put a game plan together and determine when is
the right time to start tipping the transmission. I'll probably get as many
bolts as I can easily get off as is off. Then, we'll come back here and
remove the trans bracket and hold this puppy up with just the jack. Then once it's being supported
at the rear by the jack, I can let the jack down or up, depending on what I need to tilt the whole engine transmission to hopefully give me
a little better access to some tough to reach hardware. I mean there's really nothing left to it, but to do it. Shall we? (lo-fi music) Okay, so now we've got
all the bellhousing bolts at least loose. I've got two left in just
to keep the transmission from falling out before I'm ready, but I'm just about ready. I've got my handy-dandy
transmission jack here. Now you could do this
with just a regular jack but it's a little sketchy. One of these makes it
a little less sketchy. So I'm gonna ideally wrap
this chain around the top and lash it to my platform here, put the platform nice and tight up on the bottom of the trans
and wedge this puppy out. There we go. (audience applause and cheering) There she is. As easy as that. I mean, honestly, yeah, there was some elbow grease involved but it's kind of to be expected. But it's definitely doable. See? So now we've got a lot
of stuff to put back in which means we got a lot
of stuff to talk about. We've got to look at all the parts we got. I guess it's just - Does that make sense? All right, so we've
got the old pedals out, ready to put the new ones in. So it's more than just
bolting the pedals in. You've got to run some lines. So one line, this soft line, will come up to our brake reservoir here and catch some brake fluid to come down to our clutch master cylinder. That's what this system
operates on, brake fluid. So there's a little nipple
hanging off the backside of our reservoir here that is not open. It needs to be cut so that
fluid can flow through it. So I'm gonna cut that. And then this line will
come up to that reservoir. Then this hard line will go out and down to the transmission,
to the slave cylinder. And that's what will operate our clutch. So we'll get those lines run,
get these puppies bolted in, and then we're off to the races. My favorite place to work on a car is in the driver's footwell,
there's plenty of space. You can lounge super relaxed-like, and it's therapeutic
for your back and neck. That said, all the nuts
and bolts are tight for the new pedal set. So now with that done, we
are fully over the hump. We're putting manual stuff in the car. So now it's really time to hit the ground. So next, I'm gonna go under the car and pull off the automatic flex plate so that I can install
that lightweight flywheel and our clutch kit. Now this would be a great time to replace your rear main seal. However, that puppy is bone dry and pretty fresh at 93,000
miles so I'm gonna leave it. So, just jam a flywheel on there. - [Eddie] Don't you need to
put the pilot bearing in? - Yes, I do need to put
the pilot bearing in. Thank you for reminding me. All right, so to push
our pilot bearing in, first I cleaned out the
hole that it's gonna go in with a little Scotch-Brite. I'll also put a little bit of lube on it like a little WD-40 or something. And then the real trick
is to find something to push it in with. Sockets are pretty much always gonna work, easy thing to go with. But if you're pushing on the inner race, you're really gonna damage
the roller bearings in there or the balls rather. So you just want to
make sure you're pushing on the outer race and
everything will be fine. So like that. So that's cleaned out, spray a little lube, tap it home. No big deal. (funky music) Good. That's a pilot bearing installed. And we didn't even forget about it. Now, where is that flywheel? (grunting) All right, so I just put two bolts in and evenly tightened them down just to pull the flywheel all
the way onto the crankshaft. Now with the rest of the bolts I'm gonna put a little bit
of orange threadlocker. This is high strength, but removable. I love this stuff. I'll put it on the next six bolts and then I'll pull out these first two and add some threadlocker. You definitely want to put threadlocker on your flywheel bolts. You don't want your flywheel coming off. (funky music) So as you tore down these bolts, you're naturally just
gonna spin the engine which makes it pretty
hard to torque them down. Now they make tools that'll
lock into the flywheel teeth and you can attach to the engine. You can also use a pry bar. Now these teeth are only
responsible for starting the car. They only interact with your starter. So don't be too worried about
a tiny mar here and there. It's not that big of a deal but you're gonna have to do
something to keep it from moving. Okay, now that we've got
our flywheel installed and torqued down, it's time
to install the clutch disc and the pressure plate. But before we do that, we've got to make sure that we clean off the pressure plates, mating
surface, and the flywheel. Most of this kind of stuff is shipped with a light coating of oil
to keep it from rusting. But you got to make sure you get that off before you install it. Clutches don't like oil. All right, with all that stuff cleaned, now it's time to install our clutch disc and you got to pay attention
to which way you put it on. There's a right way and a wrong way. The good news is that usually
it'll tell you what's what. You can see here it says gearbox side. So this side of the clutch
disc needs to face the gearbox. And I've got my clutch alignment tool, which is necessary for
aligning this thing. You won't get your transmission installed if you're not using one of these. This end just goes into the pilot bearing and this end locates your disc. It keeps it all centered. (funky music) So with the hardware started, now we're gonna tighten it all down evenly to tighten our pressure
plate in an even manner. Now we torque. You know what I'm "torque-ing" about? (laughs) (disco music) Okay. And with that, we're ready to
jam a transmission in here. Let's go get it ready. We got to prepare it just a bit. - [Narrator] Big announcement. - Donut is looking for new - Sorry, can you give me a minute. You guys, Donut is looking for new hosts. Do you love cars? Do you know how to work on cars? Do you have a potentially unhealthy desire to be the center of attention? Perfect. Then go here or click the link in
the description below. We're looking for the funniest
person in the pit crew, the most hilarious person in the shop. If this is you, submit to be a host. If this sounds like someone you know, encourage them to submit to be a host. The last time we did this, we met both Zach Jobe and Jeremiah. - Thank you guys so much
for watching my audition. - Hello Donut Media. My name is Zach Jobe. - You could seriously be next. So go ahead and click that link or send it to a friend and let's make videos about cars together. - Goodbye. All right, before we go jamming this new old transmission into the car, I want to do a couple of things
to ensure proper operation. So, we're just gonna
clean a few things up and put a little light coating of
grease in some critical spots to keep things from squeaking
or making any weird noises. And we're gonna put a new
throw out bearing in place. Just the things you need to do before you actually put a transmission in. Because if you you put it in and your old throw out bearing was bad, boy, would you hate yourself. How do I know? Disengage, engage, disengage, engage. I'm also gonna throw
the new trans mounts on while we got it out of the car. All right so with that, that's all the prep work we needed to do for the transmission. And it wasn't very much. That was pretty easy. So now we just got to put
the transmission in the car. Let's hope it's just as easy. - [Eddie] That's one way to do it. - So that's what connects
to the bottom of the shifter and actually does the
shifting on the transmission. And that'll connect to the shifter, shifter'll drop in here. Sweet. Now it's actually ready to go in or so I say. Hey, who knows? (lo-fi music) I think I'm on my last bell housing bolt, the last bolt for the starter. And then, once that's done, you can pop the shifter arm into place, get the rear trans bracket
back on, hold the trans up, and then do things like drive shaft and shifter from the cabin. And we've got to put our slave cylinder on and connect it to the
lines we installed earlier. And we're in the homestretch though. You could say. Okay, now we've got our shifter connected to the transmission. It's time to actually
mount the new shifter to the shift arm. So I just need to cinch this collar underneath the lip on this arm and we'll be in business. Okay, so the shifter
assembly itself is installed. Now we just gotta put our shifter on. The final piece of the
puzzle, most exciting piece. So let's see. Hell, we're going full
rally all the way up, baby. Woo-pa. Woo-pa! All right, it's all coming together. All right, now I'm just
gonna go down below and crack the bleeder
on the slave cylinder. We'll let some fluid flow through, then we'll bleed it and then our clutch should work. Not bad. Not too bad. So last thing we gotta do here
before we can fire the car up is a little bit of hacking. So this was an automatic car and automatic cars have a computer that controls the automatic transmission. So we just have to take that computer out and basically pull its brain out. And then we'll be able
to start the car up. And we'll probably have
a check engine light but we'll be able to fix
that with a scan tool later. But we do need to take out
this chip out of the trans ECU to be able to start this thing up at all. So... (electronic music) Obviously this is not the way to work on an ECU that you care about but I don't care about this thing. I don't need it to do anything. In fact, that's why I'm
trying to turn it off. And with that, the automatic
transmission's brain is no more. So now we can actually
put this back in the car and everything should be fine. It won't know that it doesn't have an
automatic transmission. Well, like I said, I think we will get a
check engine light but this would have stopped
the car from starting because there's a lot of
stuff that should be there that isn't anymore according to this. So we'll put this back in the car for safekeeping and now it's time to fire this pig up. Neutral, okay. No clutch. (engine starts) Wow, what a babe. (engine revving) Wow. We did it. Fourth gear, baby. Fourth gear! All right well, at first it seems like everything is working. I do feel a slight jutter I
think from the driveshaft. I'm worried about the
center support bearing. However, if that needs
replaced, that's no big deal. I can replace that real
quick, but the fact is the wheels spin and the gears engage and all that feels smooth. So I'm ready to call this a win. And I think it's time to
put things on the ground and go for a little test drive. What do you think? Yeah? Let's do it. Feels like a manual car. Hey, I need a garage door opener. Everything feels smooth out the gates, just sitting in there. The transmission shifts really
nicely, nice and smooth. Got a little extra noise
cause this is open. Ahh. But that feels good. Clutch pedal feels nice. It seems to be doing its job. Yeah, shift's good. Ah. And you know, something that
I'm really excited about that I haven't actually talked about yet is we're getting a little bit of a, almost a bump in power with this swap. You see this car has a - well it had an automatic transmission and this car with the
automatic transmission came with a 3.91 diff. Now that's a pretty short ratio. It works great with the automatic but with the manual transmission, it ends up being a pretty short ratio. Now what that means is that
this thing is gonna wind out a lot sooner. Our top speed is gonna drop, but it's gonna feel a lot torque here while we get to that top speed. So even though we didn't change
anything with the engine, this thing got a lot
faster in terms of like, the kind of driving we're
gonna be doing off-road. We're gonna be not really
looking for top speed, I don't care about
going 140 miles an hour. This thing will probably
top out around 120 now. But it's gonna get there
a lot quicker than it did with the automatic transmission. So, since we've got the
manual and the 3.91 diff, this thing feels a lot quicker. Sure, it wasn't easy. There was a lot of grunt work. I got as dirty as I've been in a while but now I've got a manual
E36 and it's in great shape. This car as is, would
probably cost me easily $2,500 to $3,500 more
than I paid for the car. And I paid less than that in parts. Sure, it took some time,
but you learn a thing or two along the way and it's kind of fun. So I would say that
buying an automatic E36 and manual swapping it is
a great way to get yourself the E36 of your dreams. This used to be an automatic and now it's not. What could be better? So I hope you guys agree. Let me know in the
comments, what you think if manual swapping a car
is worth all the time and money it takes. Thanks for watching. I will see you guys next Wednesday. In the meantime, don't forget
to go follow me on Instagram @zachjobe and follow Donut @donutmedia. And please don't forget
to like this video. It's how YouTube knows that we're doing at least a decent job at our
job, which is making videos. So please like it,
subscribe to the channel, and come back next Wednesday
for more E36 stuff. (engine revving) Traction control. What a loser. (car engine revving) (car tires screeching) - [Narrator] Have you
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