'84 944 - Auto to 5-speed swap?

[Arne2]

I'm popping over from the 718 section to ask about a 944 transaxle swap, auto to 5 speed. I've done this years ago on a 240Z, it was a fairly straightforward replacement process. Are there any real gotchas on this in a 944? Is the body shell essentially the same?

[Arne2]

After digging through the inter webs a bit, it appears that this swap is far more complex than I would have guessed, to the point that many only recommend doing it if you have a complete five speed donor car. So I won't be rescuing the car I looked at. Too hard to sell as an automatic, but too expensive to convert to manual.

[Tom]

If you have all the parts, it seems like a pretty doable project, but I suppose if you are sourcing parts one at a time, it becomes too expensive fast (pedal, hydraulics, flywheel, bellhousing, clutch, tranny, shifter/boot, linkage, gauges, dme tune, and probably a dozen things I'm forgetting....). On the other hand, a totaled 5-speed 944 is pretty cheap.

[Arne2]

@Tom, I think it would be a viable father and son/daughter project to build a cool first car. But as a rescue project, I can't invest that much in it and still break even when I sell it.

[Tom]

@Tom, I think it would be a viable father and son/daughter project to build a cool first car. But as a rescue project, I can't invest that much in it and still break even when I sell it.

Definitely. Until these cars go up in value more, the cost of parts would exceed any value-add you would create (sadly).