94 Celica GT ST215 Transmission Advice Options

[Kevchek]

First off, my names Kevin. I’m new to the forums over here. I’ve owned my st215 swapped gt for about 2-3 years now. It was stock when I bought it, the turbo went so I slapped a ctx15b 58mm on there and drove the piss out of it until I finally threw a rod and piston out the side of the block. It sat for about a year and a half and I’m finally buying a new motor and bringing Cali back to life. I pulled the motor and trans this past weekend and decided to see how much a rebuild would cost on the s54 transmission. The trans would grind third on downshift unless I revmatched and shifted without the clutch. I figured it would only be as simple as syncros. Well that wasn’t the case, turns out everything needs replacement. I got a quote from a very reputable shop, that I’ve used for years, with a price tag of 2100$! For a transmission that was only meant to handle 200hp. I thinks that’s insane. I was looking into an e153 lsd from an Mr2. If that’s even possible how can I achieve it. Basically I’m looking for a better alternative than the piece of garbage s54. Suggestions ?

[Box]

If you could find a lower mileage S54 out of a stock Celica you'd be ok I believe to use it as is outside of putting in a LSD and changing the gear oil. Realistically you'd be in around $1,500 or less for the S54 and LSD, maybe half as much if you found a good deal on the trans and an used helical LSD. That and it's direct fit since it's a direct replacement, and all your accompanying parts are easy to find still as they're o.e.m. replacements. Yeah it's not as strong, but I think if you stay in the 300-400 hp range and aren't abusive you'll be ok. The info is around here somewhere on using the MR2 E153 and the E153 in general. I think Smaay may've used a MR2 E153, I think kurt95gt used a Camry/Solara E153, and I'm unsure on SnapshotGT but I'm sure he used an E153 as well. All of those were MZ V6 swaps. Then more recently njccmd2002 did a 2GR swap, but I can't remember if he reused the S54 or put in an E153. For the E153 I think you use a MR2 turbo clutch. At some point I could tell you indefinitely what all was needed off the top of my head, but it's been years since I looked into doing all of this for myself. Try searching through the forum via Google, since forum searches usually are bleh and this one you have to search more than 3 characters I think which rules out just searching E153. The first page of results looks promising:
https://www.google.com/search?q=6gc+e153&am...me&ie=UTF-8