I want a manual transmission

[Ksnau]

So I've decided to torture myself again and try to figure out if there's a way to get a manual transmission in this baby. Bronco

A lot of this has come about because it's looking like the transmissions in these just aren't going to last. You know the filter isn't changeable unless you pull the whole transmission out, which is ridiculous. They're not even rated for the amount of power that the 2.0 makes, and it seems like there's a decent number of posts on here about transmissions grenading and early like less than 100,000 mi

So I was thinking that if I'm going to have this transmission grenade anyways, basically I'm either going to sell this and get a full size bronco or something else which will end up costing me a lot of money. Basically anytime you sell a car instead of repairing it, you usually end up losing money, especially if you don't keep the cars for a long time and I do really love the baby bronco.

So anyways I contacted some tuners and basically it's looking like it's going to take a standalone now. What'll probably happen is if we can get it to work and it will keep the stock computer to run most of the stuff and then the stand-alone will run the transmission and and some stuff related to it. But we're still not sure how that's going to work out. I've only just been starting to talk to HP tuners about it and I'm working with the local shop. I'm going to stop by next Friday. They actually have a focus RS there cuz that's the transmission I'm going to use because they're so similar the focus RS. And the bronco sport Badlands so we're going to go up there. Take some measurements. See if we can even figure out where the shifter would end up. Make sure that there's no obvious difficulties that would stop the process or make it too insane for it to be done because I still want to keep the bronco as stock as possible and keep the off-roading provis. I don't want a rally car.

But I will update y'all as the process goes and what we find out. However, it seems that my budget is woefully inadequate to the task, so this probably won't happen for like a year or two anyways, but we're trying to get the preliminary stuff figured out now to make sure that I'm not just wasting my time. But basically I found a shop that does a lot of work with ecoboost and focus rs's which is what I'm basing the project on. So hopefully we can get it to work in a decent enough manner where it's not destroying the stock capability. And how the car works just to get a manual cuz I don't want that

Sponsored

 

[Warped9]

This will be interesting.

It wasn’t a deal breaker for me, but I really wish there had been a manual transmission option for my 2024 Bronco Sport.

 

[Jake25]

Anytime you sell a car instead of repairing it, you usually end up losing money, especially if you don't keep it for a long time.

 

[Quashish]

This would be epic. The MMT6 uses cable shifters so shifter position shouldn't be too difficult. (I wouldn't think)

Also a good deal of aftermarket support. Carbon synchros, LSD etc. Mountune and jacks transmissions is where I've got my transmission parts for my ST.

 

[CLR]

Neat idea, but if you’re worried about cost I think selling your BS and buying a manual full-size will be way cheaper overall. And you could have it tomorrow.

 

[wireman]

To each his own. My manual days disappeared many moons ago.

I have night sweats thinking about driving a manual on the SoCal freeways in this day and age.

I hope you achieve your goal. I just don't see any advantage in it for the Sport.

 

[Mwittke5857]

What kept me from getting a G6 2 door. I could get the V6, but not with a manual. I figured the Sport would be a better option if I had to have 4 doors and a manual

 

[Escape2Bronco]

I basically caved in when I got the Sport but it was meant to be an interim vehicle until my 2 door was built. For the most part, most of my vehicles have been manual transmissions beginning with learning to drive a ‘55 Chevy with a three on the tree. There have been a few automatics over the past years. I drove in Chicago traffic for many years during the 70’s and early 80’s and while I survived, I will say that would probably change my mind now if I was still there although the clutch on the ‘23 2 door is way lighter than those from the 60’s and 70’s.

 

[Warped9]

Living in a big city with a manual transmission is likely not a lot of fun—been there, done that. But now I live in a much smaller town where the countryside and the open road aren’t more than five or so minutes away. Thats ideal if you like driving a manual.

I bought my 2024 Bronco Sport last October when the 2025 fullsize Broncos were not out yet in Canada. So I had no idea Ford was bringing back the Base model 2dr for 2025. I didn’t learn that until February. If I had known that I’m wondering if I would have waited to see and price one out before deciding what to buy.

Mind you I don’t regret buying my Bronco Sport. And now I know I likely would have had to special order a Base 2dr. Bronco with the manual and then wait for delivery, and it would have cost me about ten grand more than my Bronco Sport. And the Base Bronco would have fewer features than my Bronco Sport Big Bend.

Ten grand more for a heavier, thirstier, not as good handling and lesser equipped vehicle just for the sake of a manual transmission doesn’t sound like s good trade-off.

 

[Colibri]

Kudos and good luck on you endeavor. I drove a manual for 25 years before, I got my BB. I learned to drive in San Francisco at the age of 16 and I went up and down the hills and managed city traffic with ZERO issues. I did look into the manual Bronco but like many it was out of my budget.

 

[Quashish]

Neat idea, but if you’re worried about cost I think selling your BS and buying a manual full-size will be way cheaper overall. And you could have it tomorrow.

Very true but it would be badass

 

[Sojourner]

A manual transmission is - for me and my wife - the only thing the Bronco Sport is missing. Would buy one in a micro-second.

(And though this isn't the Ranger5g or 6g forum, same goes for the Everest if it ever came here. Would buy it in a minute, too.)

 

[Ksnau]

This would be epic. The MMT6 uses cable shifters so shifter position shouldn't be too difficult. (I wouldn't think)

Also a good deal of aftermarket support. Carbon synchros, LSD etc. Mountune and jacks transmissions is where I've got my transmission parts for my ST.

Yeah that's what the shop was saying. The location for the shifter probably wouldn't be too big of a deal and since I don't plan on taking this thing over 300 horsepower or at least that's what I'm saying now. I'll probably won't upgrade anything inside the transmission just depending on where it comes from. Give it a thorough look over and replace anything obvious but probably keep it at stock specs cuz I don't need it to handle crazy amounts of power and sometimes those upgrades can really affect regular drivability depending on how crazy you get with it.

Basically, my big worry is that it's going to lose the ability to off-road at slow speeds and I don't want that. If I'd wanted a rally car, I would have gone and gotten a focus RS. The crappy point about the baby broncos that doesn't have a low range so if this does work out it'll definitely be a lot harder with slow speed. Off-road it's really easy to burn a clutch out doing that.

In case y'all didn't know when you're off-roading using a manual, you really shouldn't be modulating the clutch a lot.
The one upgrade that I had only thought about my brain haven't even thought if it's even possible was if I remember right. Some of the gears like there was something where like for second and third runs off of a intermediary gear. And basically I was thinking what if I could get a higher gear ratios for first gear by replacing those with higher numerically higher ratio gears so instead of having like 18 to 1 final drive ratio I could like double that to like 36 to 1 which I think would be plenty. However, that's assuming it's even possible and if it's possible, that's assuming you could even get big enough gears in there and make it work and then also that the cost wouldn't be prohibitive, which it most likely is.

 

[Ksnau]

I have bad news, it only took him 2 minutes on the lift to see it won't work.

It's a different engine I guess the mating surfaces between the engine and trans are different like the 2.0 in ours is not the same engine block setup as the focus st 2.0 or the 2.3 in the focus RS. Also, the sub frames, the PTU, everything is different so he said nope. Well if you wanted to swap everything it might work but it would cost a lot and everything would be custom and that's not what I want so no manual transmission, sorry peoples.

 

[Quashish]

Dang, yeah a full rs swap could be done at a cost. Almost anything is possible if you throw enough money at it.

Sponsored