I used to have a 1985 Corvette with the Doug Nash 4+3 transmission. It had electronic overdrives on 2nd, 3rd, & 4th gears. It worked well on the street being if you came up on traffic you could manipulate speed without up or down shifting a gear using the clutch, you just pushed the botton on the shifter. I understand the writers concern for a manual tranny with more ratios greater than 1-1, and ultimately Alex your point of ratios which allow these Big V-8’s to run at drastically reduced rpms allowing great fuel economy serve the greatest number of owners. Of course if you really want to play you do what I did back in 1974. I slipped a completely blueprinted 1970 LT-1 engine into my ’68 Z/28. I pulled the tranny and installed a custom geared M-22 “rockcrusher” and a 3:88 12-bolt rear end. My LT-1 engine could pull 8,000 rpm. That combo allowed me to witness many dumbfounded expressions on several LS-6 Chevelles and Hemi or 440 Roadrunners as I walked away from them with my little 302 Z.
Here’s the specs on the Doug Nash 4+3 transmission 1984 thru 198888 Z51 cars are…* indicates the elect OD ratio:
1 : 2.88
2 : 1.91
2 : 1.30*
3 : 1.34
3 : 0.90*
4 : 1.00
4 : 0.68*
