Im undecided which way to go with the Lane, either leave it with the auto, shift kit it and a hi stall converter or put a 5 speed in???

At the moment its just a 5 litre running stock with a soon to be 3:45 LSD diff.

All opinions and help will be appreciated.

Cheers, Justin

The 3.45 made a big difference to mine.
But in saying that they are still slow off the mark.
For ultimate performance the manual would be the way to go , but it will be very costly.
A V8 T5 conversion costs a s**t load. Then they have the problem of blowing 3rd gear when you put a good amount of power & load onto it.
So seeing as though you want it for performance you will be driving it hard. My NF at the drags the other day come in at 1850kg , so they are no lightweight.
So driving it hard + the weight = big load on the gearbox and a big hole in the wallet.

My lane runs a shiftkit , its ok but nothing great. Next port of call performance wise in the gearbox area will be a 2500-3000 stall. This will be after I have fitted the GT40 heads and Explorer manifold.
I would prefer a manual and if there was a better , afforable option to a T5 I would have one. But I dont have the cash for a T56 conversion , could not justify it on the lane anyway and the T5 is just going to cause ongoing problems so I will stick with the auto.

Yeah Im picking up a 3:45 diff for the Lane tomorrow!! Ive been researching the home made shift kit and decided Id go there and build one so should have that sorted in the next week. Stall converter wise what am I better off running?? Im only looking at a different Inlet Manifold and a few other bolt on performance mods for the time being and a decent exhaust system.

Seriously for the seventy odd bucks they cost just buy a already made one from shiftkits.com
They are neat , can be hooked up in 10 minutes and best of all work straight out of the box.
Get a decent set of extractors and a 3" single system for the lane. It works wonders.
This is what mine is. It run a 15.7 at the creek the other day and it has really root all done to it. Not fast number by any means. But it was a fairly warm day , the car was warm from doing a couple of burnouts , most of the runs were back to back and it weighed in at 1850kgs.
K&N Filter
Advance Extractors (are meant to easily fit with GT40P's)
3" single system
Underdrives
MSD cap , rotor and coil.
Shift kit
3.45's and the lokka.

Thats a very good time for a NF. Do you have E7 / HO combo? Or is it GT40P / HO?

in my EF Fairmont auto ive ran 3.23, 3.73, and currently 4.11's......... and id have to say all of them arent enough to fix the s**t BTR ratio's, but the 4.11's are a minimum in my books

the 3.73's were barely noticable from the stock gears in my car, so i doubt the 3.45's would do much

however, when your running these same ratios behind a manual, you can notice every diff ratio change.

so my vote is for manual + 3.45 diff........ or auto + 4.11 diff

Depends if you want to drive a manual or not! I would go for a manual in pretty much any car, even if they are a touch slower (eg ZF auto vs T56 or hi-po drag cars).

Christ, 1850! Is that with you in it? lol

Auto's are nice for cruising around in, but for more spirited driving i'd pick a manual any day. That's why i converted my Eb Ghia to a manual, and i also have 2 Eb Xr8's, both manuals. You can minimise the chance of lunching 3rd by having the box rebuilt & fitting a billet retainer.

Cheers

ToranaGuy