Ok, this could be leading up to some exciting swap options...

I suffered strange looks from the sales people at the Isuzu dealer this morning. I crawled under about a dozen Rodeo's and Axioms, only 1 of which was even 4wd. They had the 3.5DI Axiom, 3.2 Rodeo and 3.5DI Rodeo. I didn't see anything on the window stickers about where the tranny was from, but all autos were the AW tranny. Easiest way to ID it is that it has 1 big, long rectanular pan. The 4L30-E has two pans. Or at least, a single divided pan that looks like 2 pans at a glance.

The 1 4wd they had was a Rodeo. The transfer case is a new one. It is not the tried and true Isuzu gear driven t-case. It is something else. Looks kinda like an NP-231, but passenger drop. It's definitely a planetary reduction, chain-drive case though, and looks a bit lighter-duty than the t-case of old. Couldn't see any tags on it to ID it. According to the brocures, the t-case has a 2.05:1 reduction.

Now, the interesting part... The flange and bolt pattern on the front of the case and the tailhousing of the tranny looks just like that of the old gear-drive case. I could only see the bottom half of the flange area, but it definitely looks the same. I'd bet it is the same and they probably did it so they can bolt this t-case, and the Axiom's TOD case up to the tranny with the same tailhousing. This also means that the output on the tranny is *probably* 27 spline, again, to keep parts as common as they can. It would be very cool if it was as you could just bolt an Isuzu gear-drive case right up to it. I'd bet it is, as it's common for different OEM's to use different output shafts to their specs on this tranny. With Tera's, you could go from a light-duty, chain-drive 2.05:1 t-case in an '04 to a very stout, gear-drive 3.07:1 t-case with all bolt-ons

I wish now I would have checked one of the Ascenders. I'm pretty sure it uses the 4L60-E that GM uses in the Trailblazer. What's interesting is that the brochure lists the same 2.05:1 low range that the Rodeo has instead of the 2.72:1 Autotrac t-case that the Trailblazer has. If this is the same t-case they're using in the Rodeo, then that means.... that... they have a special tailhousing for the 4L60-E that will allow an Isuzu t-case to bolt up <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> This is exactly the adapter I was thinking I'd have to make when I was working with the 4L60-E, but it's possible there is a factory option out there. I did not think to check this though when I was there.

I'm not sure who it is that is doing the LS1 swap into a VX without looking, but it's possible that a factory adapter exists from the Ascender that'll work to bolt the TOD case to the 4L60-E.

--Dan