393 and an AOD

[jim_howard_pdx]

Eric is a competent racer, but he is not knowledgeable about the AOD.

A fairly stock AOD will survive 750 HP without problems. A fairly stock C4 will disintegrate at 550 hp.

When you put the 1,000 dollars into building up the C4 to take 500+ HP, you would still have a stronger transmission putting the 1,000 into the AOD. It is simply a terrific transmission for racers. You can use a 4.10 or 4.30 gear ratio at the track, and drive home on the freeway at 2,500 RPM at 65 mph. That is fun.

The AOD is mostly based upon the FMX transmission we ran behind 525 hp Clevelands in the 70's. 10 and 11 second brackets were easy on FMX units. We went with C6's when we worked with big blocks or 9 second brackets.

The AOD's shortcoming is that the Ford engineers went for gas mileage instead of going for performance. A stock AOD will lock the torque converter upon shifting into third gear. It just takes all the wind out of the sails when you are racing.

LENTCO in Canada created a conversion to keep 3rd gear in an unlocked circuit, but maintains 4th gear lockup on their street AOD transmissions. These will take 750 HP all day long. They also build race units for 900+ hp engines behind their strip AOD's. These have single shafts deleting the locked converter.

I would strongly recommend that you speak to Art Carr, B&M and LENTCO. They will advise you on what units they sell. You need to decided what bracket you plan to race in. Because if you are after 10's or faster, you will probably want a set up that runs consistent. A transbrake transmission is what I usually recommend for those that live for the quarter mile. I would recommend a street AOD version for those who like to pick on Corvettes and Porshes on the highway.

If you are good at reading manuals, an AOD is fairly easy to rebuild on your own. I rebuild my Automatics and I have never had a problem. If you could get LENTCO to sell you a converter and Control Valve, you could probably buy a rebuild kit from B&M and do the whole thing for under a thousand dollars. If you want to do this, get an AOD from a 93-95 Ford Truck. These will have the lower or wide ratio gear set, and the 2" band for the overdrive. You can buy these for about 150.00 at most auto recylers.

Hope this helps.