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NV4500 Rover Adapter

30K views 118 replies 34 participants last post by  Landy_Andy 
#1 · (Edited)
Rather than hijacking another thread I will ask in a new one. I have a GM NV4500 with a dodge bell & I/P shaft mated to a rover LT230 as this was what I had and luckily it was a post 96 box so same as dodge. For me the GM O/P shaft was easier to mod for a rover LT230. There was a thread recently about this where they went dodge O/P shaft and it cost them on behalf of a customer $2000 , fair enough. I personally paid about 1/2 that for mine and can get the spud shaft off the shelf if I need another. Now to my question why? surely it would be easier to bolt it upto a US tcase, an NP205 from a gen 1 dodge would have the correct drop if you wanted to be all dodge or even an atlas or for $2k a lomax on a GM nv4500. Is it a rover thing or people just want permanent 4wd. I keep asking myself the same question but for me in the UK it is a lot more difficult and therefore easier to justify going for the adapter. What are your thoughts or comments.

Gaza
 
#50 · (Edited)
I am bumping this thread because I just bought a 1998 NV4500 out of a low mile 2500 Dodge. It is getting swapped into my pile of junk soon.

The trans is a gasser and I have a diesel input shaft for swap in. I am considering keeping the 23 spline output and running my welded spud shaft adapter since I have it and it's served me well and it's a 100% direct bolt up to the trans. T case is a 1.003 LT230.

I want more info on this twisted spline output that has failed behind a 6.5 GM diesel. Was the shaft annealed and re-hardened or just welded hard? Mine was welded hard and the stock rover couplers have good metalurgy and hardness characteristics. I am debating running the spud shaft I built for now, and if it fails, to do something like Shane did, using a 2wd Chevy mainshaft.

Any info on how the spud shaft was made would be helpful.

Edit - I should add that my homebrew adapter has been 100% reliable and shows no signs of twist, and I have not been friendly to it. I'm seeing 30PSI of boost, which is apparently 200 hp and about 500 ft lbs of torque, max GCVWR has been up to about 18K lbs, but the damn loosey goosey dodge automatic keeps the shock loading to a minimum.
 
#51 ·
I have the transmission that was coupled to the GM 6.5 you are talking about now. Bought it from Ryan.

You are better off to talk to Shane at Roverhybrid about EDM an input gear for you. If he will take it on I might like to get a couple done at the same time.

Keith at rovertrx also claimed advance was going to release a newer kit as well. And Marks from AUS carries the spud and a conversion piece as well.

JP
 
#60 ·
I have the transmission that was coupled to the GM 6.5 you are talking about now.
So was the NV itself modified?

I am lookign for one, to go infront of an atlas.:laughing:

Pete
 
#52 ·
After the beating my stuff has held I am not convinced that the rover spud shaft is too weak. I think I will run it and see. I can make a spare and change it out anywhere. What I would like to know is if the 1.003 input gear is same as other LT230s. I think that it is. If so I will make a 35 spline input gear on my shaper out of a spare gear I have here (they appear identical). Although I like Shane's conversion it is not practical for me due to the resplining of the mainshaft to 32 spline. I want to use an off-the-shelf NV4500 mainshaft if at all possible.
 
#54 ·
Pretty sure your input gear is different from later ones. It will be quite a bit thinner. Hard to plan for the future using older parts. Of course the inner splines (10?) will be the same, is that all you are confirming? If you make the splines longer they will interchange with the later LT 230's.

Hope that helps.

Spill it Popeye. What is your source? Who will have?
 
#55 ·
I did some searching last night and it looks like the suffix A 1.003 just uses a standard suffix A input gear from that vintage. The early gears are quite a bit thinner, and the tooth angle and tooth count is different than the later stuff (not clear from what I have found online).

If this is so I have a spare gear up in the rafters and I will have a closer look at it.

Pendy did you get that twisted output shaft along with the transmission? If so hit it with a file near the weld zone, see if it's still got any hardness, or cut it and see how deep it runs. I have a feeling it may have been heat treated as an entire unit after welding. Based on the hardness of the output shafts I have here it should have snapped with little twist.
 
#57 · (Edited)
There is an NV4500 mainshaft from a Chevy P series van application that has a 35 spline output and is 25 inches long. Part number is 25331 and runs about 150$. It originally ran a fixed yoke and is 35 spline so I am guessing it has a standard involute spline profile. It should swap into a Dodge NV4500 by changing the mainshaft 5th gear to a chevy style 22 tooth gear.

I have been poring over NV4500 parts catalogs and something cool occured to me. NVs came in a 5.61 and 6.34 1st gear variety. By mixing and matching a 5.61 style input and corresponding countershaft gear, with an early style 6.34 5th gearset, you end up with a .64 overdrive ratio, or 1550 rpms at 60 mph on 37s, or 1625 rpms on 315/75R16s, in my case. That may be too much gear for even my rig (VE pumped 6BTs are well into their torque at 1500 rpms). Although I am sure it would spin it, it would leave one hell of a hole between 4th and 5th.

Maybe I will just forego the homebrew adapter and try this out. Again we are back to the LT230 input gear thickness when hogged out to 35 spline. Probably too thin to be workable. The solution is probably a replacement gear.
 
#58 ·
Rob Dassler- Southwest Rover - LR transmission rebuilder - Buys gears for LR boxes from a UK vendor. They are interested in this NV 4500 conversion as well. Would be nice to have a gear broached before hardened. I briefly considered buying some parts to send them to start something up. Could be an easy solution. Give Rob a call and chat with him about it.

JP
 
#61 ·
Sm465

With all of this talk about the NV4500 I would like to make a case for the SM465.

I have a sm465 in my RRC with a dana300 tcase. This gives me a crawl ratio of 60.5 with 3.54 gears. There is also a 4:1 kit for the 300.

It is true that I have one less gear but I do have a larger gear range the range of a NV4500 is 6.07 while the sm465 is 6.55.

If price is an option then you can search around and find a sm465 mated to a dana 300 rebuilt for around $1000. In fact I know of a place you can get this deal. Plus the SM465 has a reputation for going a couple hundred thousand miles before needing a rebuild.

Cheaper, more availability, wider gear range, 20# lighter, several inches shorter and you can rebuild it in your drive way with some gasket maker and a hatchet.

Just a thought,
Matt.
 
#65 · (Edited)
With all of this talk about the NV4500 I would like to make a case for the SM465.

I have a sm465 in my RRC with a dana300 tcase. This gives me a crawl ratio of 60.5 with 3.54 gears. There is also a 4:1 kit for the 300.

It is true that I have one less gear but I do have a larger gear range the range of a NV4500 is 6.07 while the sm465 is 6.55.

If price is an option then you can search around and find a sm465 mated to a dana 300 rebuilt for around $1000. In fact I know of a place you can get this deal. Plus the SM465 has a reputation for going a couple hundred thousand miles before needing a rebuild.

Cheaper, more availability, wider gear range, 20# lighter, several inches shorter and you can rebuild it in your drive way with some gasket maker and a hatchet.

Just a thought,
Matt.

The NV4500 has a much wider gear spread. 5.61 to 0.73 would be about a 9-1 first gear in comparison to the spread of a direct 4th trans. I would much rather run an NV with 4.10 or 4.56s than an SM or NP or other 4 speed as to get the same results I need to run much higher axle gears, 3.54 or 3.07 and it loads up the driveline. The granny 4 speeds are great for a low buck beater, but the price of NV4500s is not that bad if you look for deals and that OD is absolutely necessary for my rig. If I do try this GM 5th gear swap I could conceivably run down the highway at 1550 rpms. Considering I got 20mpg last summer on my trip to moab, which calculates out to 1800 rpm with the auto, I'd bet I could beat that mileage (22-23) on 37s. I was very often looking for an additional overdrive. 1550 is low, but I usually drive 70 mph anyways, and that works out to 1800 rpms.
 
#62 ·
Regarding input shafts.

I had a custom Isuzu-LT230 adapter shaft made and has been in for about 18 months now. I haven't had the T-case off since but will to install my new sandwich seal to hopefully prevent all future leaks from the LT230 input seal.

I can't recall which material it was made from, but it was a tooling steel which was then hardened to almost 2,000 MPa.
I feed enough torque through it to light up 29" tyres on dry tarmac in a 2.3t RRC with 1.003:1 high range. So it'll be a good test.
 
#68 ·




Did a little checking and the series adapter is about 6-8 weeks away with the LT230 version due out later in the year. Its clockable and works with all of Advance Adapters Dana 300 style adapters.

Matt at Advance is the guy coming up with it.


-Jeff
 
#78 ·
I came up with the figure by reading a reputable 4x4 website. After your response I did the math and realized that I was wrong. The NV has a spread of 7.68 and the SM has a spread of 6.55.

I believe that the original number was based on adding the 0.27 OD to 5.61. It turns out that this doesn't work with ratios. :shaking:

Dont believe everything you read on the web. People like me can really fuck you up.:flipoff2:

I did do the math with a SM and 3.54 R&P and a NV with a 4.11 both first gears are around 23:1 plus what ever tcase you have. At 60mph there is a difference of 350rpm. That is with 33" tires. The larger your tires the lower your rpms. So with 37" tires there is a difference of 240 rpm @60mph.

I still do think that the SM has much better bang for your buck.

Matt.

PS. check my math I might have screwed this up too.:grinpimp:
 
#80 ·
I multiply the first gear ratio by any number representing the rpm. Then I multiply the top gear ratio by the same number then I divide the answer from the first gear by the answer from the top gear.

Please explain what in the world you think the answer is.:laughing:
 
#86 ·
Diesel, SM465, D18, Saturn, and then 3.56 gears.
I want to go to 4.10 gears.

The SM + Saturn runs pretty damn near what I have seen NV4500s go for. But the Staurn didn't hold up to well to the torque. I had lessthen 15k on 9it when it grenaded. Now I don't need an entire new unit, the case is ok. But do need enough parts that I am thinking the NV is a better way to go and then I am just going to run a double jointed rear shaft. Seen plenty of folks doing it on the highway with no problems.

No OD and the fuel consumption just sucks on the highway.
 
#87 ·
So how much torque will the Series t-case live with?

I am thinking since I have a very good condition SM465 maybe a ranger od + the sm465 set up will be a better idea then the NV4500.
The ability to use the OD as a gear splitter was very nice, both off and on road. 3rd + OD was perfect for going up over Eisenhower and Vail passes.
 
#88 · (Edited)
I think Slade said his Ranger was loud. Seems like a decent setup though. You need a turbo :flipoff2:

Edit:

Ike has busted a T case output shaft on a Series case. I would use one but he has me worried. The LT230 I think has a better torque capacity.
 
#90 ·
I used to drive a IH with a T19 and a ranger and at highway speeds the ranger made it almost to noisy to talk in the cab.

for hauling heavy loads it was the ticket, We would be pulling a huge trailer and the ranger split the T19 perfect. If AA coulde ever quiet that thing down it would really be something special.
 
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