If yur buying, choose a Commando 3.09-1.91-1.40-1.00
If you wanna fix the slow-shifting, I know the cure for that, PM
But the best Idea is really to get rid of that box, the splits as you have found out, are really far apart.
There’s nothing wrong with the 833 OD transmissions. It just depends on the application, just like everything else. For a stock to mild performance engine the splits are wide, but they’re not unmanageable. And for a street car that sees freeway time the utility of the overdrive gear is hard to beat, especially for the price you can usually pick the 833OD’s up for.
If you’ve got a high winding small block car that sees mostly strip time they’re the wrong choice for sure. But that doesn’t sound like application of this particular car.
Besides, if you’ve built some high winding small block for track use you probably have the money for something else in the transmission department. But for a street car on the cheap an 833OD can be pretty handy. Not everyone can afford to drop $3k (or more) on a gear vendors or a 5 or 6 speed.
The splits aren’t any worse than most of the cars that came with 3 speed manuals, people made those work just fine for decades. Hell the NP435 in my ‘71 Ford F100 goes 6.68, 3.34, 1.66 and 1:1, talk about wide splits. I drive it like a 3 speed ignoring granny low, and I put a decent number of miles on that truck every year too. Are there transmissions with better splits than that? Absolutely. But it works just fine the way it is too, and a lot of people love the hell out of those NP435’s.
