Tremec TR-3160

Tremec's lighter six-speed manual — in the Cadillac ATS, the sixth-generation Camaro and the Mustang GT.

It is not the TR-6060. Tremec's heavy six-speed sits behind the largest engines; this is the smaller, lighter unit for the ones below them, and the two share an application list and no internals. A car described as having a Tremec six-speed may have either.

Its recurring complaint is shift feel rather than failure, and much of it is designed in: these are notchy when cold and reluctant into second until warm, which is normal for the synchro material.

Where owners meet a genuine problem it is usually the clutch hydraulics, not the gearbox — a bite point that has climbed, or a gear that becomes hard to select when hot, both of which are the master and slave cylinders rather than anything inside.

A crunch into every gear is the clutch not releasing; a crunch into one gear on a fast change is that gear's synchro. The distinction decides whether the gearbox has to come out at all.