transmission/ t5

[85 ranger btm]

I'm in the middle of looking for a t5 trans for my truck and I'm not sure exactly how much horsepower and torque my motor has, but i found an article that showed a motor that was built about the same as mine and that guys had between 350 and 370 hp. i don't recall what his torque was, but i know it was well over 300ft lb. A stock t5 is rated for 300ft lbs. The other trans i found was the tko 600 which is rated for 600ft lbs. my only problem is i can get a rebuilt stock trans for like $500 to $700 and the tko 600 is like $2500, and this is sum what of a budget build. i guess what I'm asking is how much can the stock trans handle and which trans u guys think would be the way to go? thanks!

[cgrey8]

There were LOTS of "stock" T5s over the years and each one had different max torque ratings. The ONLY production T5s that I know of that were good to 300ft-lbs were the 90-93 Mustang 5.0L T5s (rated 300ft-lbs) and the 93-95 Cobra's T5 (rated 310ft-lbs).

In the aftermarket, there is a T5 'Z-spec' (aka T5z) which is rated to 330ft-lbs. This trans was never put in a production vehicle but was a popular aftermarket upgrade.

Astro Performance makes T5 parts that bring the max tq rating up to ~500ft-lbs assuming your case is from one of the sturdier production World Class T5s.

For more than you probably wanted to know about T5s, here's a GREAT article that covers the various T5s and their torque specs over the years:
The many different faces of the T5