This car has 470k on the clock. I have driven this car about 200k since I put a manual transmission in it in 2006. This forum deserves I a lot of credit as I was able to get a lot of questions answered.

The first transmission I put in was from a 76 240d, it had the iron case and worked well until 2012 (aprox 150k) It started to get pretty scratchy downshifting in to second. Since I was pulling the transmission to do another clutch anyway, I decided to put a new (salvage) transmission in.

The second transmission was the aluminum case variety from an 82ish 240d. As I mentioned earlier I decided to weld the clutch disk hub, so I would not have the springs break and cause problems. That trany did not last long... IIRC not even a year, the welded clutch worked fine but the gearbox was destroyed (broken gears, holy crap)

The third trany went in in April of this year. It is a iron an iron case transmission that came from a 74 220d.

None of them have had alignment pins that I am aware of. I have never taken off the intermediate plate between the engine and the bell housing. I have not needed to, as the manual tranys bolt up the same way that the original automatic did. I am not aware of any way to adjust how the intermediate plate is centered. Interesting thought though..

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1980 300TD with 1985 300TD Turbo motor and 240D 4 speed.