used to go by the name "icebones" but the frekin computer messed up my account...

anyway,  i have a 1980 chevy k10 with a th350,  i plan on swapping it over to 5 speed in the near future,  but i have a majior problem,  it seems like 28+ years of rust have eaten away at the transmission fluid cooler fittings,  where the lines run from the tranny to the radiator,  the threads are rough and stripped and it is leaking,  does anyone know what size these fittings are?  im pretty shure that they are #6 AN size,  and how would a person go about replacing these fittings without removing the trans, engine, radiator or any other major component from the truck,

for the time being i have spread a good ammount of high temp epoxy around the fitting to keep it in place and to prevent it from leaking,  but this wont hold forever.

 any help or advice would be extremely appreciated...  

if the threads are boogered up on the lines then i would take them off and put an external tranny cooler and mount it in front of rad...youll have new hoses,cooler, fittings,clamps,mounting hrdwre...and try to clean the holes in the tranny carefully...if the threads in the tranny are messed up then i dont see any other way but to drop tranny and fix it in the open so nothing can get in your way...  

the fitting can be replaced in the radiator tank, and replace the hard lines. if the line are ok aside from the fitting, you can use compression fittings and replace the first few inches of the lines near the radiator. they can be purchased already flanged with a new fastner.
on the tranny end, it has brass fittings that screw into the aluminum tranny case, the brass will break or strip before it hurts the aluminum case..

BTW, if you never got my e-mail, I restored icebones back to active, just update your e-mail and cancell the neo-ice.  

just got back home today,  after a short test drive the expoy seems to be holding for now,  no leaks,  yet

the problem is where the cooler lines go into the radiator,  would an hardware store have compression fittings?  or do i need to go to an autoshop.

the threads on the radiator are fine,  its the fitting that messed up, and it seems i lost a good ammount of trans fluid,  what does a th350 hold like 11 quarts?

also the idea of putting an external cooler would work, but im tight on cash right now.

many thanks...  

also about my account, my computer has a firewall or a block thinggy,  i dont know much about computers,  but if you did send me an e-mail it probally got blocked,  but no harm done.  

as i said above i am planning on converting it to a 5 speed manual.  i am almost certan that the engine is a 27 spline,  the engine is an lt-1 from a 1990-1997 corvette (not shure of the exact year) and it has been converted to carb,

would a trans out of a newer year model chevy 1500 series,  say about 1990 fit?  i have a good welder so putting in new cross-members and transmission mounts wont be a problem,  i just wanted to get an idea of what im getting into.