94 Celica GT ST215 Transmission Advice Options

[Kevchek]

First off, my names Kevin. I’m new to the forums over here. I’ve owned my st215 swapped gt for about 2-3 years now. It was stock when I bought it, the turbo went so I slapped a ctx15b 58mm on there and drove the piss out of it until I finally threw a rod and piston out the side of the block. It sat for about a year and a half and I’m finally buying a new motor and bringing Cali back to life. I pulled the motor and trans this past weekend and decided to see how much a rebuild would cost on the s54 transmission. The trans would grind third on downshift unless I revmatched and shifted without the clutch. I figured it would only be as simple as syncros. Well that wasn’t the case, turns out everything needs replacement. I got a quote from a very reputable shop, that I’ve used for years, with a price tag of 2100$! For a transmission that was only meant to handle 200hp. I thinks that’s insane. I was looking into an e153 lsd from an Mr2. If that’s even possible how can I achieve it. Basically I’m looking for a better alternative than the piece of garbage s54. Suggestions ?

[Kevchek]

Thank you all for your great feedback ! I actually found a JDM e153 trans(which came with helical LSD) with only 50k on it! The price tag is $2k. So common sense tells me to go with that. But I’m still a bit nervous about doing this swap because like someone in the reply, I haven’t found a decent how to on this swap. The axels seem pretty straight forward. But my main concern is the linkages. MR2 linkages would point to the fromt of the car no ? Wouldn this require me to do some fabrication to the transmission ? And what about the clutch ? I just don’t wanna jump on this and then be stuck trying to figure it out on my own. And then in the back of my head everyone’s telling me the s54 isn’t as bad as I thought. So do I avoid all the work of swapping an e153 in there and just go with a brand new s54? They’re both literally the same price. But one requires a little more time and labor to accomplish. Thank you guys.
-Kevin