cynicwanderer
Member
I bought a used '94 E350 7.3idi van four years ago to use as my race support van/motocycle hauler. it's an extended van, so after installing a conversion van rear seat/sleeper it is now the perfect vehicle to do this. I can camp out/sleep on race weekends and have plenty of room for up to 3 motorcycles and gear. I have driven it to many races in California/Nevada/Arizona over the years and several camp outings and discovered things that I love and hate about it. One of the things I have a love hate relation ship with, is the E4OD transmission, which is pretty standard in these vans.
I originally selected this particular van, is because I wanted a simple/reliable power plant. having had some experience with 6.9/7.3l idi diesels in the past in F-250 trucks, I was excited to find a van with it. what I didn't realize at the time, is that the E4OD is computer controlled and it needs a TCM (transmission controller module) to make it shift properly. while the IDI diesels does not need a computer itself, it has now has several sensors, like TPS, RPM, VSS, MSPS, etc... that all need to work properly, before the transmission will work well. with this being older technology, there are various connectors which like to leak/corrode and otherwise fail on these. another thing, even when things are working well, the E4OD likes to hunt in the mountain switching between 2-3-O/D, never really being very happy, unless I override it with the shift selector. the final straw, is that it likes to over heat when you go slow with some load, like crawling up hills, which I discovered after installing a locker and doing some off roading with it.
I could go on and tell the story about how I spent two months trying to track down an intermittent starting issue, which turned out to be a bad connector on the transmission to the manual shift position sensor, which has the "neutral" safety switch circuit that locks out the starter.
Whenever I'm reminded of these shortcomings, I keep dreaming about having a manual transmission, and have been planning on how I could do a swap on this van. Being a 4th gen van '93-, there was never a factory option for a manual transmission, so I figured it would be an ordeal and have been holding off. after reading a couple of van manual transmission swap threads on here by VANMAN and naterry, I got inspired and got started on a swap.
I originally selected this particular van, is because I wanted a simple/reliable power plant. having had some experience with 6.9/7.3l idi diesels in the past in F-250 trucks, I was excited to find a van with it. what I didn't realize at the time, is that the E4OD is computer controlled and it needs a TCM (transmission controller module) to make it shift properly. while the IDI diesels does not need a computer itself, it has now has several sensors, like TPS, RPM, VSS, MSPS, etc... that all need to work properly, before the transmission will work well. with this being older technology, there are various connectors which like to leak/corrode and otherwise fail on these. another thing, even when things are working well, the E4OD likes to hunt in the mountain switching between 2-3-O/D, never really being very happy, unless I override it with the shift selector. the final straw, is that it likes to over heat when you go slow with some load, like crawling up hills, which I discovered after installing a locker and doing some off roading with it.
I could go on and tell the story about how I spent two months trying to track down an intermittent starting issue, which turned out to be a bad connector on the transmission to the manual shift position sensor, which has the "neutral" safety switch circuit that locks out the starter.
Whenever I'm reminded of these shortcomings, I keep dreaming about having a manual transmission, and have been planning on how I could do a swap on this van. Being a 4th gen van '93-, there was never a factory option for a manual transmission, so I figured it would be an ordeal and have been holding off. after reading a couple of van manual transmission swap threads on here by VANMAN and naterry, I got inspired and got started on a swap.
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