All Standard Trans

I rebuilt my Jeep Wrangler AX-​15 5 speed, with the guidance of my uncle who is a mechanic who rebuilt transmissions professionally. This was my first transmission rebuild. Kevin talked me through with advice, and sold me the parts I needed. I had some troubles after, and my engine died shortly after (at 286k miles). We’re stroking that so while its out I brought the transmission in. Apparently we did a good job on the rebuild, yet there were other worn parts we had not replaced. He identified them and checked our work. Since I’m a dying breed who will only drive manual, Kevin will be my go to guy in all circumstances. He is also a pleasure to work with. Five stars all the way.

We have been using Kevin for the last 4 years to resurface our flywheels. His work is great and his turn around time is exceptional. His pricing is very fair as well. If you don’t want your a bay held up all day because the guy resurfacing your flywheel is treating your job as «fill in» then use Kevin.

I did some research on who in the area could rebuild my t5, and every single person I talked to said to go to Kevin. I was a little reluctant at first off of an oddball review, but decided to go talk with him anyways. — best decision ever.
I walked in with the tranny and told him what was going on, told him that it grinds 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th while getting stuck in fourth quite often. He told me he would tear it down and inspect what was wrong. All while trying to ‘ball on a budget’ as I am still a broke college student.
He gave me a call not 6 hours later telling me he had torn it down and had looked it over. He didn’t want to quote me until I came down to see what he was talking about.
So I went down later that day and he walked me through every part in the transmission, recommending what should be replaced, what could be used again, etc. He even went through the trouble of finding good parts to compare the bad parts to, just to show me the difference. He was very straight forward with me unlike most other shops I have dealt with.
All in all, we decided what would suite me best, and I decided to rebuild it, reusing some parts. He told me he would have it done in a very reasonable time frame (less than a week) and then called me the next day to tell me it was ready to be picked up!!! All while meeting my initial budget!
After my experience, I couldn’t help but realize that the oddball review was clearly a mishap, not something that reflects Kevin’s work in anyway shape or form.
I will be recommending all my friends/​family to Kevin for any MT work needed in the future. And I will be coming back the next time I have transmission issues!

The shifting on my newly rebuilt transmission was poor with frequent synchro grinding, so I contacted Kevin to ask if he’d take a look at it. Kevin refused, stating I must have a clutch problem and that he doesn’t warranty racing applications at all.
I explained that I’d aggressively checked for clutch problems. The car had zero clutch drag at redline in 1^st gear with the wheels in the air and the clutch fork was articulating correctly: you could hear the input shaft spin up/​down at the expected friction point. Kevin wasn’t receptive and again insisted he has no warranty.
Frustrated, I ran an endurance road race this past weekend with the T5 Kevin built. I and 4 other drivers ran practice laps with Kevin’s transmission to get a feel for how it shifts, then voted to see if we’d rather continue to run it in the race the next day or replace it with a used T5 of unknown origin/​miles I bought on Craigslist as a spare for $ 75.
My drivers and I were all very dissatisfied with the shifting of Kevin’s transmission, complaining of frequent grinding and near lock-​out in normal use in both up and downshifts despite careful rev matching. We voted to replace it with the $ 75 Craigslist special and spent the next few hours swapping it trackside.
During the swap, we went to great pains to avoid changing any non-​transmission parts to allow for a direct transmission comparison. The clutch disc and pressure plate were never touched, the master/​slave were never bled or disconnected from each other (the slave unbolts from the outside of the bell housing)), we re-​used the shifter and filled it with the same GM synchromesh fluid.
My drivers and I all agreed that the $ 75 Craigslist special shifted dramatically better, allowing easy heel toe 4 – 3 and 3 – 2 downshifts and effortless 2 – 3 and 3 – 4 upshifts without grinding. It continued to work well for many hours of road racing without any degradation, further evidence we didn’t have a clutch problem.
In my direct experience, a $ 75 Craigslist transmission performed better than a $ 1000 rebuild from Kevin. I am keeping Kevin’s transmission (along with my receipt for the rebuild) and will happily loan it to any fellow racers interested in evaluating it for themselves.

I had Kevin build me a transmission for my ’54 F100 project. It’s a modified world class T5 with an S10 tail housing. The transmission has been working great.

I needed some parts for my 62′ ranchero 3 speed transmission. They knew the exact parts, and located them for me in SECONDS. I will be coming here for any and all of my transmission needs. Top notch dudes.

If you are looking for someone who REALLY knows all about transmissions, it is Kevin. I am restoring a vintage Corvette Stingray with a Muncie transmission that had been rebuilt, but of unknown origin. I noticed excessive play in one shift arm, which raised my suspicions as to the quality of rebuild. I stopped by Hot Rod Service in Campbell (another quality shop), and they highly recommended Kevin. After my experience, I definitely agree.
As I was doing a frame off restoration, I pulled the Muncie and took it to Kevin for his expert opinion. While it was mostly rebuilt correctly, he found an incorrect shift lever assembly (hence the excess play), a worn shift arm, a missing gasket and alignment pin. He also recommended upgrading to a heavy duty bearing given the HP of my engine build. The work was done expertly and quickly.
If you are rebuilding a vintage sports or muscle car, you owe it to yourself to have the transmission done right by an expert. There are a lot of good engine builders out there, but don’t expect many of them to know enough about transmissions to rebuild one correctly.

I have used this guy a couple of times for sublet work. His work is clean, updated, and it works with a quick turn around. Big props!

Sooo if your having some transmission issues and you need someone who will fix it quick, most likely be able to find the parts your looking for, not rip you off, AND not do a half-​ass job this is your place! Highly recommend — Kevin does awesome work!!!