My 1850 eats gearboxes for breakfast! Can I fit the stronger Sprint gearbox?
Ha bloody ha! Yes, but you need to rotate the engine in its mounts by about 7 degrees so that the gearstick will appear through the hole in the tunnel cover. This will be easiest achieved by the fitting of a Sprint front subframe and engine mounts including the brackets on the side of the engine. The exhaust down pipe may need modifying and you will need the propshaft from a Sprint as well; then to make it reach the 1850 rear axle you will need a 1 1/8 (28.5mm) spacer to suit the propshaft and diff flanges. I have recently been down this very labour intensive road and still ended up with an 1850 gearbox, as I did not want to go so far from standard (insurance). Although the Sprint gearbox did improve the ratios of first and second gears (I test drove it without the gearbox cover) it was only when I came to fit the gearbox cover that I discovered the seven degrees rotation of the engine. Probably done to make room for the 16-valve head on the Sprint! If you are going to go to all this t
