My trans in my '90 740 is going fast it appears and have found a used one on sale for $43 at pick'n pull that's in an '88. Both are AW 7 type. I've read as much of the faq that I can find. No odo in car but it appears to have been very well taken care of, new shocks, new seat upholstery, ac conversion, etc. The sale ends tomorrow so I have to move on it I think. I don't know why the car is there, there's some body damage that's not major but maybe it was enough to end it's life. Fluid is drained but the dipstick smells ok. So the question is, what should I look for in doing this swap? I have to use my old pan so will clean it thoroughly of course. will the driveline be the same? other parts swap over? Kickdown; keep my old one? My car was working perfectly til 1st made lots of noise yesterday.
Thanks

I got the tranny, it smells ok, that's all I know so far. I met a guy who told me that he once took a used one that he didn't know the history of to a good shop that looked at it on the bench and replaced a couple of gears, and that it was fairly easy to do and not expensive either. I hadn't heard that one could be checked that way before. I'm going to make some calls in the AM. Any thoughts here?

Also, the pic'n pull wouldn't let us use a jack under the car to lower the tranny so I came up with some seats from some other wrecks and dropped it onto those, worked well, no damage.
I got a converted air cond. compressor, the system still had a charge so doing the R134 conv on mine should be easier I hope, no draining the old one and hoping it works.
There was an all metal radiator made in Sweden; is that a good thing? It appears like it should fit my car but the listing at FCP says they're different between '88 and '90; anyone know?

The trans itself is bolt on plug-n-play. The bell housing from the 88 will not have the cutout for the engine speed sensor, so you will have to swap the bell housing, which means you will need bell housing O-ring, and should replace torque converter seal as well.

It will fit fine. Keep in mind that N/A cars have locking torque convertors, turbo cars do not. You don't state whether either car (yours or the donor) are turbo... but just be aware of it.

IMHO, if yours is a turbo (non-clocking T/C), and the donor car is not, adding the locking torque converter would be a very nice upgrade -- particularly for highway driving. In fact, I'm looking to do this very upgrade to my 945T.

I would not, however, go the other way: putting a turbo (non-locking) tranny into an N/A car. While it would be a direct bolt-up repacement and function properly, you would be stuck with a "constantly slipping" tranny. (Why Volvo ever specified a non-locking tranny for turbos is beyond me -- it's rediculous.)

Jeff Pierce
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'93 945 Turbo ( one kickass family car ! ) 197K miles, '92 Mercedes 190E (my daily driver) 170K miles, '85 Jeep CJ-7 w/ Fisher plow 225K miles, ’95 Lawn Chief

Thanks to both of you; both cars are N/A. The speed sensor tip is very helpful. I'm going to take a look at one more yard today to see if there's a better one, if not prolly go for it.