so a manual tranny out of what will bolt to my sunrunner?

Well as far as bolt in trans, we don't know,
the guys with the auto trannys are taking
advantage of a design in the trans which is
a GM trans that has a removable bell housing.

This gives an option which hardly ever happens,
a tranny that has several engine options by replacing
the bell with the appropriate bolt pattern to fit serveral
different engines. I guess if you wanted to bolt in a BMW
engine, that would be an option too, but with the easy
availability of the GM 60* V6 why would you go for
a more expensive motor.

rover3.5  olds buick215 engine... made of aluminum... its a 370 pound v8. Think I can bolt it to a 2.8 tranny and swap the whole nine yards in or is the rad gonna be a problem?

I dunno if the Buick engine is the same bolt
pattern as the GM 60* Chevy motor. V8 is
different than V6 if I'm not mistaken.

Rover do they use a GM engine

gm built aluminum olds/buick 215(3.5) 63 and 64. Sold to rover in late 70s.  All land rovers and range rovers have that engine.  Olds bellhousing can be changed to small block chev, big pattern.  May need 4.3 tranny/tcase

this place squeeses them in mgbs, have custom bellhousings for cable setup as well.  I believe they can make custom flywheel to accept inputshaft
http://www.aluminumv8.com/

rover3.5  olds buick215 engine... made of aluminum... its a 370 pound v8. Think I can bolt it to a 2.8 tranny and swap the whole nine yards in or is the rad gonna be a problem?

Friend of mine stuffed one of these engines into his TR-7 years ago making it a TR-8, and the thing was a rocket when it ran well. Seems to me like it was kind of unreliable though and required a bunch of upkeep. Last I heard he had sold the engine and was looking for a FORD Powerplant to replace it. It's a beautiful car, molded flares, recaros and older 3-piece BBS's. Bling, Bling!

Zooky:
Hey as far as a 3 speed bellhousing, give Hawk Suzuki a try, I think mine was only 30 or 40 bucks when I had to replace it.  Not as good as free, but relatively inexpensive. Might have had 50 into it total with shipping but that was about 4 years ago so who knows now.  **edit** You might see if they have one that's broken on the part that bolts to the engine but the back half is in good shape on.  They'd probably let one like that go for shipping since it's worthless as a part.  Probably worth a call anyway.  Also, I just remembered, I *might* still have my broken one, although I think I was pissed off at it and broke it into tiny pieces with a hammer (long story).  I'll double check when I get home though.  Don't count on it though, the more I think about it the more I'm pretty sure I chucked it.

Wildgoody:  The "optional" one is the one in the Isuzus.

Tracker_TN, not positive but most S-10 blazers I've seen have a driver side drop for the front so that's not going to be as easy to bolt in.

Something else to look at might be some of the Heep Cherokees with the 2.8, not sure if they had the passenger side drop still but I believe they were the mid-late 80's as far as model year goes.  I know the earlier Cherokees had a passenger side drop.

If the passages are pretty close we can probably make it work I think. worst case if they're way off then we'd have to weld it up and machine em back in.

If you have access to a black crayon and some somewhat thin paper, (and a scanner or good digital camera) Do a "rubbing" on the back of the V6 bell housing and post it.  I think the factory manual *might* have a pic of the 3 speed housing's passages so I could compare em.

It's probably not looking good if the Chevette housing is quite a bit different but then again the newer design in the tracker could be different from the chevette too (hopefully).

here you go:

Here is some new information for the swap,
or just a trick auto with lower gear 1st and 2nd.

OK the 4L30 trans gears will fit into the 3L30
case, but the shaft, which is part of the gears is too
long, so to make it fit it needs to be shortened and
re-splined, now you got some lower gears for offroading
a better low 1 and 2 with the same 1:1 third, cool huh.

Now here is the flip side, the 4L30 trans that comes from a
Diesel Isuzu trooper is an all hydraulic valve body, and only
needs 1 wire input from a throttle position sensor, which all
SideKicks with autos have, so if the T-case will bolt on the the
4L30 this would be a trick 4 speed auto conversion, cool again.

Some more info to think about, now what

Wildgoody, that sounds like a good deal.

If you get to actually swapping in a 60 degree v6 though I think I've found a much better option than the 4L30.  The 4L60.  It actually weighs 8 pounds less than the 4L30, has loads of aftermarket support including standalone controllers, and you can get a kit to slap a Dana 300 t-case on the back of it.  

It also has a 3.0:1 1st gear and the overdrive is .69:1 so you'd probably get even better milage if you drive on the highway a lot.  On existing automatic 4.62 gears I'd estimate about 2800 RPM at 70-75 depending on your tire size.

All in all it sounds like a much better way to go if you go with the 60 degree v6 swap.

My comments on this thread are to help move the
information out to the readers, after all if you don't
know what can be done, nothing will change. As for
me and my Kick, I'm going to trick out the stock
equipment and make it as bullet proof as I can.

Lower 1 and 2 gears would be great for increased torque
with the larger spread of the 3 speed auto.

so if the T-case will bolt on the the
4L30 this would be a trick 4 speed auto conversion, cool again.

the answer to this is YES, well kinda. There is an adapter between your automatic and T-case. This adapter will bolt directly  to the 4L30 with the exception of one bolt hole. This hole could possably be drilled into the transmission or maybe even left out, there are 6 other bolts and is no fluid in there to leak out. The output shaft of the transmission is 27(?) spline and the input of the Tracker T-case is 24(?) spline. Thats a small problem. You could take the Trackers output shaft and install it in the 4L30 from what I can tell.

No the 3L30 is shorter that the 4L30, at least that's what
this trans guy said, he said the shaft could be shortened
and re-splined to fit the 3L30, but I don't know how you
would lengthen one, I would think a coupler would be an
easier solution. 24 to 27 splines, if there is room to fit it.

the 3L30 its self is shorter because the 4L30 is basically the same with an overdrive section added to the front of it, and I mean that literly, it looks like they just bolted on another section. The output shaft its self is the same length but its a different diameter