I’ve been having transmission issues with my racecar for a while now. It’s a Mercedes 190E 2.3-16 with the (in)famous close-ratio, dog-leg Getrag 275E gearbox. The transmission is actually on the fragile side and has been giving me trouble lately. Turns out the 190E Gruppe A cars actually ran the Getrag 265/5 transmission (like the early E30 M3) for exactly this reason.
This particular model was only sold in the USA for 1 model year and that was 30+ years ago. Spare Transmsisions are hard to find. Some parts are NLA ... including some key components needed to rebuild the trans. So, I’ve pretty much given up on the 275E gearbox.
There’s a shop in Sweden that makes an adapter to convert the Mercedes bell-housing to fit a T56 transmission. In the long run, this seems like the most logical solution. They say I can keep the stock flywheel and pressure plate and only swap the clutch and transmission. I’m guessing I’ll also need a custom driveshaft, but that doesn’t seem like a big deal.
I don’t know anything about American cars. If I want a T56 to work with a twin-cam, four cylinder with 7500 rpm redline ... what donor car am I looking for? I’d need the complete shifter assembly in addition to the gearbox itself.
