FF Whats going on. I graduate from school mar.2 and i figured its that time to swap the auto trans and go to manual. Im doing it myself. I swapped a trans on a manual car before. But this will be my first time actually having to put a clutch pedal in an automatic made vehicle. I dont mind paying the money and putting in the time. But does anybody have any experience or opinions on swapping the trans in an automatic vehicle???? [popcorn]

i did the swap last march. its pretty easy.

i did it on a Zetec but the trans are the same but have different bell housings.

How long did it take? Did you have to cut a hole through the firewall for the clutch pedal?

im all eyes and ears on this. i wanna make my focus manual!

if you have a hoist should take you 8-9hr start to finish.
there is already a hole for the clutch lines, you will need the brake pedal assembly out of a manual car since the clutch pedal mounts to it.

Ok and i obviously would have to get the trans harness out of a manual focus as well. Right???

nope you can rewire the ATX harness, thats what i did it was pretty simple. keep in mind this was on a zetec, im not 100% on the duratec, but it should be pretty much the same procedure.

wire the VSS to the OSS wires
jump starter cables in the range sensor connector (or put a relay in attach to the clutch pedal)
wire reverse lights

i have a zetec. wish i could find a donor car

nope you can rewire the ATX harness, thats what i did it was pretty simple. keep in mind this was on a zetec, im not 100% on the duratec, but it should be pretty much the same procedure.

wire the VSS to the OSS wires
jump starter cables in the range sensor connector (or put a relay in attach to the clutch pedal)
wire reverse lights

I'd like to know more about what all is needs to be wired? I plan on doing this swap on my 00zetec, and I was under the impression that the harness needed to be completely swapped?

Pm me about how to re wire the harness for the swap please?

Yeah i figured the duratec would be different. Im definitly going to take pics when i do it. Based on opinions what do you think would be a good stage clutch. Its a track/ daily driver. But i still want that performance feel on the street.

If you get it done easily with the duratec I might have to drive up to NY and have you do the same for me since my autotragic is starting to fail :P Keep us updated on if you do it

Definitly =) im pretty sure it will be pretty simple

Oh, I just noticed that you graduated two days ago. Congratulations!

Thanks appreciate it. It took long enough lol

Is the swap just plug and play, or do I have to splice wires because if I do Im just gonna keep it auto.

It depends. If you got the trans for your year i think its just the tail lights.

So if I get an 00-01 mtx-75 its all plug and play? was the swap pretty hard? Im in school right now to be a transmission rebuilder, and I think this project would give me some good experience! Do you have to cut any holes anywhere like in the firewall and and where the trans goes?

Yeah it should fit. The trans alone should always be plug and play. Im not sure about your 00-01 as far as the pedal goes but it should already be there. For the 08-11 it wasnt hard because everything was plug and play. The hole was already there for the pedal. The biggest issue was aligining the clutch disc and pressure plate. You would also need a tune and an ecu upgrade

Yeah it should fit. The trans alone should always be plug and play. Im not sure about your 00-01 as far as the pedal goes but it should already be there. For the 08-11 it wasnt hard because everything was plug and play. The hole was already there for the pedal. The biggest issue was aligining the clutch disc and pressure plate. You would also need a tune and an ecu upgrade


if its really that much work, I might just keep it automatic and build it up I guess. It would probably be less work to rebuild an auto than to do the swap lol

Yeah of course auto is good on drag. Check out tom and get a tune for the auto he will hook you up.

im not trying to drag, I want the car to be manual because automatics pissing me off. I just want to know if this jobs gonna be too hard for a 19yr old haha I want to start pulling the auto trans off but Im unsure of the manual parts im gonna need.

Lol yeah it is annoying. Anybody can add on. But what you need is a clutch kit which includes disc pressure plate and throw out bearing. A flywheel, clutch master cylinder, new axles, shifter, cables, pedal, ecu upgrade, fork for throw out. I could be forgetting some things.

I heard the atx axles got the same splines as the mtx but the mtx axles are thicker? I hope it all just plugs in because I dont know how to splice...