looking for a how-to on enlarging the tranny tunnel

[wicked93gs]

well, it seems from what I read I will need to enlarge the tunnel to fit my T45...not sure whether its true or not...but I may as well do it now since down the road a couple years I plan on swapping to a T56 and its really not that difficult at this point(just a little more sheetmetal work after all) I guess I am just looking for pictures and info on how much i need to cut out and how much I need to add to get it all correct...more for the T56 than the T45(since I know the T45 will fit if I cut for the T56 to begin with)

 

[latamud]

I think the T45 looks like a T56. It might be different for your car considering the engine mounts might manipulate the engine height to something different compared to a SBF. I cut a section out and raised it about 1.5".

I lowered my engine 1" also. The trans support in the pic, I had to cut that off. That was all the clearancing I needed to get the T56 in. Well, I moved the engine back 1/2" so just a little clearancing at the firewall cut as well.

 

[DK832]

This my cut for the T-56. Have to say though that is a tad bigger than necessary because we were doing something more under there.

 

[wicked93gs]

so if you cut out the support...what did you replace it with?

 

[Shakin66]

I bought the replacement tunnel from Darkhorse and used it as a template to mark the tunnel and then cut it out....If you have factory A/C you will loose it at least until one of us T-56 users starts hacking on their a/c unit and dash to raise it up....I may do that this sumer.
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[latamud]

so if you cut out the support...what did you replace it with?

If you look at the support it is there to hold the weight of the transmission hanging off it. At first I was worried thinking it was tieing the frame rails together but I came to the conclusion that what I left was just as effective at tieing the rails to the floor. My T56 is mounted on a modified foxbody double-hump cross member and mounted farther back on the frame rails.

 

[jikelly]

My T56 is mounted on a modified foxbody double-hump cross member and mounted farther back on the frame rails.

Not that I need them, but I'm sure others would really be grateful to you if you posted a how to on modifying that crossmember.