^^^And fry that little NV3500 in a hurry. Putting a 360 or larger (408...EEK!) in front of a NV3500 light duty trans is askin for trouble.

Best bet is like JasonW suggested. Find a 2500 series truck with the 5.9L and 5-speed and swap over the 5-speed stuff. That truck will either have the NV3500HD or the NV4500. Ifyou plan to upgrade the 360 much in the future, go for a truck with the NV4500.

 

Dang hard to find one in manual that hasnt been beat to death, That was the reason i got the truck I did, Its in very nice shape inside adn out, Just needs ring and pinion in the rear, Thats how I got such a great deal on it. Swapping to manual isnt a big deal form I have a friend that owns a salvage yard. I have him looking for parts trucks for me.

 

Just don't pull one of my stepdad's stunts. For 10 years he had a company truck that he drove that was a standard. for about 8 of those 10 years, they allowed him to take it off base and drive it home at night. He got so used to driving a stick, that one day while driving our old automatic Surburban, he stomped the brakes in obviously like he would press the clutch in a manual. That was entertaining for a moment.

 

Lulz. Well, I get plenty of auto practice in my work van. It's a Cheb Express 2500 with the 4.8L and an auto.

Now, here's a sad thing: my work van with the pitiful 4.8L will cruise at 90MPH all day without breaking a sweat but my truck with the far stouter 5.9L Magnum will barely hold 75 because of the absolutely **** poor 46RE tranny in the truck. My work van couldn't get out of it's own way off the line but my truck is a 33" tire spinning beast in 1st gear. Bassackwards huh?

 

It's called drivetrain loss. I'm not sure what the total loss with these trannies were, but I would think it's close to the 3rd genners. They have a 15-23% total loss throughout the drivetrain. It sucks, but it's just a Chrysler thing.

 

There are plenty of people using NV3500s behind 5.9s in Dakotas including built 408s, supercharged and turbo engines without much trouble. No doubt the NV4500 is way stronger but unless you're towing a whole lot, the NV3500 would probably be fine.

 

Mine must have a 50% loss in any gear except 1st. 1st gear is the only gear I feel power in. 2nd and up feel like I just hitched a boulder to the back of the truck. The this tranny was rebuilt only 15K ago!

In my opinion, I attribute it to a once great tranny (30 years ago) that Chrystler just kept adding and modifying over the years. Chevy and Ford had the right idea: design and build a new damn transmission. Dodge's idea? Take something that worked fine 30 years ago (as a 3 speed) and add electronics, an OD module, and a bunch of other bull**** to it and call it 'good' even though it's the same old thing with a bunch of crap bolted to it. Maybe it's me, but this trans was designed to work well 30 years ago with that configuration. Bolting all these electronics to it and the OD module, locking convert and whatnot forces the old design to do things it was designed to do. Thus: epic failure, poor reliability, and very inefficient.

Stupid.

 

Which version of the 3500? Probably not the light duty. The NV3500 that came behind the 5.9L in the 3/4 ton trucks is not the same as the one behind the 5.2L in the 1/2 tons trucks, as far as I know.

 

Still waiting to a see a thread where some one actually does the swap. I have a manual and wouldnt part with it for the world!

 

I'm talking straight up, plain NV3500s found behind 5.2s.

From my research, NV3500HDs weren't used in Rams, just 4.7 Dakotas...


Some food for thought http://www.dakota-durango.com/forum/...ad.php?t=90466

Like I said, if you can get a NV4500, go for it, it's way stronger, but the NV3500 isn't no toy either.