Is a Manual C8 Corvette Actually Happening? TREMEC's Aftermarket Chief Tells All... EP031
The Automotive Advantage
Is a Manual C8 Corvette Actually Happening? TREMEC's Aftermarket Chief Tells All... EP031
The Automotive Advantage · Apr 7, 2026
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Justin, you told me earlier there was something you really want to ask, so do you want to
do that right now?
Yeah, C8 transaxle.
Everyone saw it at SEMA, everyone wants to bolt it into everything, everyone inaccurately
probably believes it's coming out in a future C8 variant.
What other people need to know about it?
Have you driven one?
Tell me all the details.
Yeah, so everybody made that assumption, right?
We show up, we show this billet manual transaxle and it looks very similar to the C8 DCT transaxle,
which we did commonize some parts, but it was not intended to be for the C8, it's intended
to be a manual transaxle that we could utilize in a lot of different applications.
Will somebody put one in a C8?
I'm sure they will.
I can tell you that the phones ring off the hook every day asking us when can they have
it, you know, because they're ready to put one in.
Welcome to the automotive advantage.
Grow your business and get smarter in just one hour.
My kid, thank you for being here, from Tremac, you're an aftermarket expert, you're a transmission
expert and you're going to tell us all about what Tremac's got going on and where the attention
is for transmissions nowadays.
So do you want to give us a quick overview of what you do for Tremac?
Sure, I run the aftermarket, so I'm the aftermarket business unit manager, so I am in charge of
all things aftermarket, whether it's marketing, whether it's, you know, running the customer
service group, whether it's sales, so a little bit of everything.
Justin, you told me earlier there was something you really want to ask, so do you want to
do that right now?
Yeah, C8 transaxle, everyone saw it at SEMA, everyone wants to bolt it into everything,
everyone inaccurately probably believes it's coming out in a future C8 variant.
What other people need to know about it?
Have you driven one?
Tell me all the details.
Yeah, so everybody made that assumption, right?
We show up, we show this billet manual transaxle, and it looks very similar to the C8 DCT transaxle,
which we did commonize some parts, but it was not intended to be for the C8, it's intended
to be a manual transaxle that we could, you know, utilize in a lot of different applications.
Will somebody put one in a C8?
I'm sure they will.
I can tell you that the phones ring off the hook every day asking us when can they have it,
you know, because they're ready to put one in.
When can they have it?
So we are actually in a prototype stage right now, and we look for early 2027 to start having
physical units.
Okay, so it's possible, we're going to do it.
First C8, we got to get them on the pod right away, but it would also fit then, I guess,
like GT500 or the new, whatever that thing's called, the Super SC, the Dark Horse SC,
right?
What else?
So I mean, obviously, there's several things that use that 9080 DCT that I'm sure people
have been looking at and saying, what can I put that in?
You know, anywhere from a supercar builder to a dune buggy, an off-road application.
Will somebody try to put one in a GTD?
I'm sure they'll try.
I'm sure they're going to try to put it in a C8.
Is it, it makes a great, a great transmission when you're talking about
doing autocross with a pickup truck or something too, right?
So somebody's going to put it in there.
I had not considered a manual trans GTD, but that is exciting for sure.
What would you put it in?
I can go to the Corvette.
I mean, that's the obvious choice, and we knew that architecture was not going to have a manual
transmission years before it even went into production.
The car's amazing, but, and I think, like, I'd like you to elaborate on this a little bit,
but what we're seeing in the market, and I've got some data about manual transmissions and
production vehicles, it's way down.
It's 2% or less in production vehicles, but manual transmission equals enthusiast vehicle
across the board, and you guys have had a lot to do with that.
Do you want to talk about that market?
Yeah, I mean, you know, so if, if you, and we'll talk, I want to say a little bit about
Tremac first, but, you know, we, we are first and foremost an OEM manufacturer, right?
And the aftermarket is a small percentage of our business, right?
What percentage?
It's probably about 10%, to be honest.
Maybe, maybe a little more, maybe 12, but, but it's about 10%.
You know, we, years ago, as we were, you know, producing six speeds and five speeds and putting
them in production vehicles, and, and you had a lot of classic cars out there that had four
speeds in them and three speeds in them, and everybody's trying to figure out how to do an
overdrive, and, and we came up with the perfect recipe utilizing, you know, transmissions that
we were already making.
We just said, hey, how do we put a shifter in multiple locations?
How do we, you know, put two different speedometers in there?
So you have mechanical and, and electronic, and so we, we went through all those steps
and we, we came out with what was originally the TKO, if you remember, which was an old
top loader.
And then as a six speed came along, we said, okay, how do we do that?
And we created the Magnum, which is virtually the 6060.
It's just in the aftermarket, we call it a Magnum and we've given it three different
locations for a shifter.
And then recently, well, I say recently, but it's been, it's been five years now that it's
been out, but we created the TKX, which is the first time we've ever created a manual
transmission solely for the aftermarket.
It was based on, you know, what, what did we learn from TKO?
What did our customers say that they wanted?
And so we created that transmission so that, you know, you could get 8,000 RPM shifts and
you could still maintain, you know, having a single overdrive and get 600 foot-pounds
of torque through that box.
What's the number one selling product right now?
Take me through the product line like you just did, but maybe the volumes are giving us an
idea of what moves for you.
Yeah.
So if you look at aftermarket, I will tell you TKX is number one.
TKX, we're selling almost 8,000 units a year.
When you look at the Magnum, we're selling probably about 2,500 units a year.
T5 is still around and we still probably sell about 15 to 1800 T5s.
I mean, it's hard to believe that that little gearbox is still out there and people are using
it, right?
But yeah, so from an aftermarket standpoint, we're probably somewhere around 12,000 units,
12,500 units a year.
And we have the 4050, which is an old truck transmission that we came out with for the
4x4 and it's rather large, but guys are putting it in old jeeps and they like it.
I know that there have been challenges for TREMEC with some of the tariffs that have been
put in place and some of the distribution paths that you guys have.
And as you're moving stuff around, you want to comment on that a little?
And any learnings that you can share to the audience?
Sure.
Well, so I will say that first and foremost, we are USMCA compliant.
So even though our transmissions are manufactured in Mexico, we have some that we do here in
Michigan, but because of the USMCA compliance, we're not really affected by the tariffs.
We are affected by tariffs on a few things from our European branch, but it's not insignificant.
I want to back battle to these numbers real quick.
TKX at 8K, Magnum at 2500.
It seems like you're really competing with yourselves though in a way, right?
Because they come in the car from the factory and then a lot of guys either keep them in or
upgrade what they have versus buying one because some people do swaps and things like that,
but I'm just thinking of all my late model brothers, they just buy the trans OE.
So how do you as a company balance that?
How do you balance like, okay, a lot of our customers are going to buy them
in the car already or they're going to buy a used car that has our product in it
versus trying to sell people that product?
What's that look like for you?
Hence the aftermarket, right?
So when you sell something in production in a production vehicle, if you look at anything that
was built after 2005, most of the manufacturers went to what we call a remote shifter, right?
So the shifter is no longer attached to the transmission directly.
Now it has got some remote device with two arms and it goes up and it attaches to the body
and you get that nice soft feel and it took care of a lot of NVH and things.
But you still have the customer that wants that direct shift.
He wants that feel.
He wants to feel that positive in and out of gear.
So, you know, even though we sold TR-6060s into a lot of Mustangs and a lot of Camaros,
on the aftermarket side, we developed what we call a Magnum XL, which has a longer extension
housing with a shifter that's directly into the transmission and it comes right up into
the console right where it was supposed to be and they get that positive feel.
And then a lot of people may think that like, well, the aftermarket one has to be better because
it's aftermarket and the OE is probably not as good because it's OE.
How do you guys balance that line between like what an OE wants versus what
Tremac enthusiasts would want versus what the aftermarket wants?
How does that blend?
Yeah, I mean, if you think about from the OE side of it, right?
I mean, they have things that they have to meet, right?
They're trying to meet certain NVH standards.
They've got to meet, you know, certain, let's say, fuel mileage standards and things, right?
And in the aftermarket, the guys are all about rolling gears and they don't care, right?
So, when we sell a 6060 into the OE market, it's the exact same transmission as a Magnum
that we sell into the aftermarket.
The only difference is the shifter.
Nothing else has changed.
The main case is still the same.
The gears, the shafts are all still the same.
It's just, do I meet a 10-year, 150,000 B10 life or do I go out and say that I can, you know,
rate this transmission at a higher number because I know that guys are not going to put
the miles on it and they're probably in 10 years going to put, you know,
what, a tenth of the miles that a guy would in an OE vehicle.
So, I can rate it a little higher and we know that those, that higher rating is going to see
short bursts if a guy goes to a drag strip, but those short bursts aren't,
they don't affect it as much as you would think.
And Jamie, you blend between the OE and the aftermarket world a lot.
You've been on both sides of it.
Like, you know how difficult it is and most suppliers never make it from one side to the other.
If you're a really good OE supplier, it's really hard to be in the aftermarket.
For an aftermarket, it's really hard to get into the OE side.
So, like, what are your thoughts here because that's one of the most interesting things about
Tremac to me is it's a name brand in the OE world and it's important in the OE world
and it's a name brand and important in the aftermarket.
We don't see a lot of companies do that right.
Yes, it's large, Mike's business specifically is largely driven by what the OE wants and then
his main team is going to build that to their standards.
There's a durability expectation, the cost is going to be the biggest driver.
I played this role a little bit at GM performance parts because we had production engines going
down the line for Corvette and there would be overrun or we could put an order in.
I'm sure that's how Mike's business works a little bit, right?
He gets a few overruns or he puts in his order before the year starts and that's how he fills
his distributor's warehouses and goes work but there is, to your point, I think where you're
headed with is there's something really special when a company is a supplier to an OEM manufacturer
and you know that there are a lot of eyes on that product before the hot rodder ever gets it.
So, am I close, Mike?
No, you're absolutely correct. I mean, that is how it works, right?
I mean, a lot of guys that see it in the OE world wish they had it in the aftermarket and
we've been fortunate that we could do that and give that same product and make it fit into
some applications that people probably never thought it would go into.
I'm going to ask him where his transmissions end up but I want you to take a guess first,
heavy domestic. I think what do you think the breakdown is for GM Ford Mopar?
All yours, just I'm curious what you think.
I don't know, man. I would say GM would win out of the big three for volume.
But probably not nowadays though, right? But I'm just thinking like, you know, C5, C6, C7 for sure.
Yeah. But then, you know, this TKX versus Magnum thing threw me off here. So, yeah,
what is the split? Yeah. So, you're right. I mean, the GM probably wins, right? In that
aftermarket world when it comes to TKX. When we looked at TKX and we developed that,
used the 70 Cheval, right? Because it has the smallest tunnel. And we said, if we can make
it fit in that tunnel and not have to cut the tunnel, we'll fit into 80% of these other cars.
And it's held true. When we did our study on that, we found that there was 272,000 A bodies
still registered in the United States. How many of those were manual? We don't know. But we know
that there was 272,000 A bodies that were registered. And we said, hey, if we only sold,
you know, 50,000 TKOs over the last 10 years, how much of that 272,000 is left out there?
And where does TKX fit into that? And then, then you look at Mustang, right? You have to look at
Mustang and then you're, you know, the Mopar world. I mean, there's a lot of tear up when
you do the Mopar world in the classic era, you know, but guys are doing it. I mean,
but I would say it's probably 50% GM, maybe 30, 35% Ford. And then you've got that 15, 20%
that's Mopar. 1% something else. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And we see it. There's,
you'd be surprised to see that there's a lot of import guys that now are putting LS,
they're LS swapping these BMWs and Supras and they're, and they're throwing in our
magnum transmission behind it. Shout out to my boy, Ty. I was at the gym this morning and Ty
was very excited. He found a three series BMW that had LS in it, Holley system,
six-speed manual, but the guy has wired it poorly and now it's a Facebook marketplace,
like he's just aboard of the project. And Ty's like, I'm ready to buy, man. I just need someone
at Holley and I need someone to notice how transmission works. I'm like, well, we got him.
We got, we got him. Yeah. So we're ready to go.
Kirk, no, Kirk has, I don't think he has one of those. Oh, we had that silver one that was
really nice. He has been home now almost. Anyways, go ahead. I want to go to marketing
pretty soon with this guy though, because he's out everywhere, but he's slid in something that was
super smart. So a lot of people that are listening to this in the shop world kind of just go by feel.
There's like, oh, there's a lot of fourth gen Camaro, so I'm going to make a part for a fourth
gen Camaro. But you were like, oh yeah, when we were doing our research, we figured out how many
A-bodies are still registered in the United States. That's smart. And I think that's worth
flagging because a lot of the time you talk about this too with mid-sized trucks, like,
hey, if you know that an OE's making X mid-sized trucks a year, you know your market size.
So let's go down that path a little bit. That's interesting. Is that something you guys just do
as a standard operating procedure, or do you just kind of, what else do you do to know a market
before you enter it? Yeah, I mean, we learn a lot from our shows. And I know that's where
Jamie wants to go to talk about marketing that, but we do learn a lot from the shows and the people
that we meet at shows. And we've learned a lot that our transmissions are used in applications
that we didn't even think they would be used in, right? But I think when we developed the TKX,
it was the first time that we actually said, what is that classic car market? And, you know,
and use that and said, here's my business case that I had to present to the plant that said,
this is why I want to do this. And engineering looked at it and everybody looked at it and said,
yeah, we think that makes sense. So TKX was probably the first time we did that.
Where do you even find that data? Oh, it's, you can get it from all the states. There's,
there's companies that have, you know, the car park, but I guess it's a really good point. I'm
glad you grabbed that because a lot of the old GM vehicles specifically had over a million
unit runs per year. So even though they're 50 plus years old, they're still, you know, 270,000
out. So it's like, you can think about the newer stuff, but production volumes for vehicles are
very low right now. And I don't, you know, a lot of people in the aftermarket know that, but it's,
it's cool to see that, you know, that's part of the strategy of what's my total car park.
And, you know, we know the data says the older car probably likes to stick shift older car owner
probably likes to stick shift experience more anyways. So it's interesting. And you've got a lot of,
a lot of guys that are building new bodies now and you can buy a complete body and build a car
from the ground up. I mean, who would have thought you'd be able to build a 69 Camaro and
be brand new car build a 68 Mustang. I mean, it's happening, right? The stuff's out there.
You know, Chevy twos, I mean, you can pick up these bodies and build a new car.
I want to ask Mike about the mix of customers of street drivers that want to enjoy transmission
really strict high-end car show build that probably put those together versus a racing
application. Why don't you take a guess? What do you think the breakdown is?
Or, and just regular street cars, I guess, or these are third, right?
What do you think, 50-50? Well, I mean, we talk about power tour a lot. I mean,
probably 70% of the market is just dudes who want to just drive them around, I would guess,
and then maybe 10% builders. Racing.
Yeah, 10% drag racers. I know that's not 100%, but let's see.
It'd be interesting to see what he says. I think you're pretty close.
Yes. I do think you're pretty close, right? I mean,
you know, as I alluded to a few minutes ago, I mean, we've learned that our transmissions are
being used in a lot of, we thought drag racing. We weren't thinking about autocross.
We weren't thinking about drifting. We weren't thinking about all these other applications.
So when you look at it, yeah, there's the guy that has his classic car and he just wants to
drive it from point A to point B and to his car show, that car show. But surprisingly, there is
a large number out there that is, whether it's a road course, whether it's a drag racing or
whether it's drifting. I mean, we were surprised at the numbers that we've seen, and it seems to be
growing on that side. Yeah. Anything else product-wise you want to ask this gentleman?
Because I'm going to start asking marketing questions. I guess this isn't really product-wise,
but it kind of is. Mike and maybe we're going to get there anyway. But people do love manual
transmissions from an OE side. Do you have any insight into, I know the numbers are declining,
but I also feel like the numbers decline because there aren't that many options for manuals in
the first place. So it feels to me a little chicken in the egg. It's like, well, no one buys
manuals. It's like, well, because you only put it in the worst car you make or whatever. What's
your vibe? Would people buy more manuals if there were more manual cars out there? Or do you think
the OE's got it right? And they're just like, literally, I know you guys keep saying that,
but no one wants them. So we're just going to keep. I think that maybe they're missing the boat a
little bit. My own personal opinion. I mean, I think they're missing the boat a little bit. There
is still a demand for manual shifted cars. I mean, people love that. You heard what was going on
with the C8, right? Everybody wants that manual transaxle. So I mean, they went out and bought
a $100,000 car and they're already to tear it up and put a manual on it. I mean, so
there's a lot of people out there that still want manuals. I'm hoping this is like
everyone's on this. We want buttons back in cars now. You know, they don't want screens anymore.
Maybe it's buttons and then the manual comes back. I feel like this call worked together.
When's the last time you drove a manual transmission car? Me? Yeah. On Sunday?
Yeah, the trans-amount. And they did Grand Sport out. Oh, that's a stick car. That's right. Yeah.
Was it the last stick Corvette? It's the last, literally the last 2019. That was the end.
That's probably a really valuable car. Well, it's funny because on Facebook marketplace,
obviously, I see all the Corvettes that come up for sale and anytime I see a C7 Grand Sport,
if they're way cheaper than what I paid for mine, of course I'm like,
what? The market's collapsing and I'll click on it and it'll be an automatic. I mean,
they trade for like 10, 15 grand lower than the manuals already and that's 2019 to now.
And in the Porsche world, same thing. I mean, a Porsche with a manual is worth way more than a
Porsche with PDK. So like, obviously the market is signaling that there is demand for these things.
You know, your favorite car, C7 ZR1, the difference between the auto and the manual is like
50, 60, 100 grand now for some of these cars yet. But I'm an automatic. But Mike, take us through,
like something we do, right, is describe the customer, right? You got to know your product,
you got to know your customer. Describe the fascination that a Tremac customer has with a
manual transmission car, that experience. Like what do you hear out on the street?
Fun to drive. I mean, that's really what you hear from all of these guys. It's fun to drive.
I feel like I'm more engaged with my car than just getting in it and putting it in drive and
driving down the road, right? Everybody wants that excitement of being able to shift gears and feel
like they're part of it. Yeah, I agree. That's why I make fun of you for being an automatic car.
I mean, it's whatever. It's going to be the beginning. That's the intro.
All right. Like one of the fascinating things Tremac has done through the years is,
and you came, I should say, you came in here with an NMRA jack-in-on, which meant the world to me,
National Mustang Racers Association. You have actively sponsored stick shift only drag racing
classes to really promote this. How did that start? How has it gone for you and where are the stick
shift classes if I want to go drag race with Tremac? Yeah. So it actually, like you said,
it started with NMRA, right? I mean, that was where we held our very first stick shift shootout in
2013. And we pulled those guys from the true street because there was no stick shift only
class at the time. So we said, well, what if we go and we see how many true street cars are there
and we say we're going to pull the top 10 or the top eight, right? And we pulled the top eight.
And we got a lot of cars that were sub-nines. I mean, they were pretty fast cars.
But we also made that stick shift shootout so that it was attractive even for the guy who had an
11-second car, right? So when you took those top eight cars and you put them on the track,
you did a staggered start, you know, you did certain things so that the little guy had a chance
too to win, right? Unfortunately, you know, NMRA, NMCA is gone. There's a few other promoters out
there that picked up things. But, you know, we've now picked up a stick shift shootout on
Hot Rod Drag Week. I'm doing it with LS Fest, doing it at South Georgia Motorsports Park.
They're doing a few different events, Sick on the Green. I mean, so I found other venues and
where we can do that. We're doing, this year, we're going to do two of them with Mustang Week.
So one in Galveston and we're going to do one in Charlotte. It is, it's attractive to these guys.
These guys love it. I mean, you know, when you show up and you can put on an event and you're
only pulling eight or 10 guys and saying, you guys are competing, you know, for this prize.
So, yeah. It's super smart marketing, right? You love this. You get to showcase your product.
You're giving back immediate attention to the customers that embrace and love you and
you get a lot of attention for your product. I mean, well done. You ever been on a stick shift
shootout? No, I'm really bad at drag racing stick shift cars. You are? Yeah. That's why I built a
half mile car because it doesn't matter as much. You got a ton of room to figure it out later. Yeah.
I'm a roadracy street car, half mile, mile guy. I'm not, the first 60 feet of a track is not where
I shine. We need to get someone on here who can teach me how to do that. Mike could probably do
it, but yeah, you don't want me launching a manual car. I'm not good at it.
Okay. Well, maybe we can get some help from you after.
No, let me know. Mike, I want you to talk about where you go. 37 shows a year. So,
talk about your strategy as you go to market at these events and what you do there and the
product you show and how do you interact with people. And then I'm going to ask you how to
rank a show that really works for you. So, we do, like I said, we do between 35 and 38 shows a year,
10 of them indoor, which means we're doing the Autoramas and the World of Wheels, right?
That's the winter months, right? So, we try to cover that in the winter months.
And then we do about 25 to 28 outdoor shows. And those are whether it's a good guys event,
you know, whether we try to pick up eight or so good guys events.
Obviously, Woodward, Jim Cruz, right? We're going to do that. We do the power tour.
And then we pick up some of these stick shift shootout events, you know, try to do some of the
drag racing, some of the car shows, you know, we may go do Back to the Bricks or do Iola or one
of those. I try to mix it up every year. Obviously, you know, we can't make every one of them. So,
I try to rotate shows in and out so that we, you know, we may miss a year here, but we'll be back
there the next year. We're not gone. I have to remind people that we're not gone. We're just trying
to share, you know, with everybody. What do we do at those events? Obviously, on the indoor events,
we have our static displays, but they're cut away of the transmission and the shifters work,
so you can shift it, you can see what's moving, what's going on in the transmission.
And then our outdoor display is very similar, just a little bit larger, because we actually
have a 38-foot trailer and a dually that pulls that and we have a nice awning over it. And we've
got all of our displays there and let guys come up. It's very interactive. I staff that with the
guys from the Techline. Why not? They're the guys that are answering the questions to the
guys calling in, so they should be the guys that are staffing those events. In the Autorama events,
I actually staffed that with, if you guys know Tremac, you probably know that Jim Averill was
in this position before me. So, Jim's retired, but Jim still has a passion for Tremac and for
manual transmission, so I have him and another gentleman from GM Performance that's retired,
Bud Pennington, who works the Autorama shows for us exclusively except for Detroit. Then I send
all of my guys to Detroit because it's in our backyard and we should be there. But at the same
time, for every one of those events, we invite a distributor, whether it's a local distributor
or whether it's somebody who's really close, but we have 12 elite distributors that we sell our
product directly to and then they set up sub distributors. So, I allow them to come and they
get the support of the manufacturer being there and bringing the product and they get the sell.
So, they're selling their business and their products because they add everything else to
that transmission, right? It's not just the transmission. The customer is going to buy a
dry shaft, whether he needs pedals, whether he needs cross members. So, we allow those guys
to work out of the trailer and they get the expertise of our team there to help them if
there's any questions that they can't answer regarding transmissions.
First of all, shout out, Bud, Milford crew. And I mean, I think we went through so much there,
I just want to slow down and go through each of those things because a lot of people struggle,
especially now, especially with rising fuel prices and events being hard and expensive and hot,
that they don't activate at events well and they don't do a really good job at them or they're
figuring out, man, we used to do those for two decades and then we stopped. Should we get back
into them? So, where do you want to start on the deep dive into how to do events here?
I was smiling as he's describing the program because it's not easy to your point and then
there's so many things that I think I know how to run a good event, but there are a lot of things
that you checked off that I was waiting for you to say. I like the staff. How do you coach
the staff to work a show? Maybe start like that. What do you tell your crew in the beginning of
the day? Well, first and foremost, anybody that I have working on a tech line is come from the
automotive world. They've either worked at a dealership or they have worked extensively at
Tremac whether it was in the lab, whether it was driving test vehicles and you don't have to coach
them much because they're as much of an enthusiast as the guy who's coming up there. They love to
talk about what they do. They all love what they do. So, not a lot needs to be done there. The first
thing you need to have at a show is engagement and how better to engage people than say, yeah,
pull that lever. Look what happens. You see what moves in there? What does this?
I love that. I mean, this is going to come to no surprise to anybody, but I go to a lot of
booths and a lot of displays where there's nothing to touch. There's nothing to like,
I call it finger fucking things where you're just like touching around the engine and stuff like
there's nothing to do and then the two guys that are supposed to be manning the booth are
just like eating a sandwich or something and no one's around to help you. They don't do that with
my kid. I bet they don't. I know they don't. I know Bud's not just dinking around in that thing,
but like and then they'll go back and be like, oh, that show was lame. We didn't get anything out of
it. It's like, well, you didn't engage with anybody. You didn't try to move the needle here.
What's also interesting here is that they're not sales guys, right? They're tech line guys
that are just like so passionate about it. So give me that vibe. Why not a sales guy?
Well, we don't sell directly to the end user, right? We sell through distribution,
so we're not a B to C or a B to B, but even saying that, I mean, we're still going to direct them
to where they can purchase it, right? But most guys come up and they want to know what's that
gear made out of or what's that shift fork made out of or, hey, when I do this and this moves,
is that a synchronizer? How does that engage? And so you want a tech guy who's there,
who's going to tell people how things work, right? I mean, it gets people more excited
about it and makes them want it. I'm interested in the evolution of the
products that are on display. This was always a challenge for me at Chevrolet performance, right?
You had a mix of new engines and then you had the classics and the ones that were
really moving the needle. Talk about how you figure out what parts to put out.
Well, so the good thing is, is that when you only have a few different models and you make them so
they fit in a lot of different applications, right? So when you take a Magnum and you say,
I can put this Magnum in any classic car out there, I can put this Magnum in a BMW,
I can put it in a Supra. We can put it in a Supra car because of the multiple shifter locations,
right? So you have your six-speed, we have a five-speed. And then if we have something
that's specialty, right, like the TR-4050, which is a four-wheel drive unit from a truck,
you know, that's kind of its own niche deal. Does it fit in a lot of applications?
Sure, but it only has one shifter location and, you know, and it's only got one set up on the
back of it to bolt up to a certain transfer case or, you know, but there's guys that create adapters
and other things. So the nice thing is, I don't have to display 50 products, right? I can display
six, maybe five, six transmissions and they all work the same, right? They all work the same.
It's just a, is that a five-speed? Is that a six-speed? And what does it fit in? And is it,
you know, is it too tall? Do I got to cut my four? Or is it too wide? Do I got to, you know, so...
Talk to me about how you measure success at a show, especially being B2B. It's a little bit
harder, right? We hear from people that are like, oh, we went to the show, we didn't sell anything,
we're never going back. And then you're like, well, how do you sell things? And like, well,
we don't have a way to sell it at a show. It's like, well, yeah, no shit that you didn't sell
anything. Or, you know, there's various methods to do that. So what does success look like for
you guys? And then ultimately, how are you measuring each show and then the whole year?
So that's the nice thing about having a distributor there, right? You know, we're not
staffing that booth with just Tremac personnel. We're inviting a distributor because he's the one
who's making the sale. And I can tell you that at the end of the show, most of those guys will
come to me and tell me that they sold, you know, an enormous amount of transmissions or,
and I'll see that in the next couple of weeks when they're placing their orders, right? You'll see
a spike, you know, that comes from that certain distributor. You'll see that they have a spike
in orders. So you know, I mean, you know, you have hard data. We know that they did well at the show
and that it's the right place to be. And then we always talk about the customer life cycle. So
what do you expect the first time someone comes up and is like, I'm interested. Tell me about this.
Oh, I didn't even know you made that for a A body. They're not going to buy one today,
probably. What are you experiencing? Do you see people do that? Or do you see people come back
a couple of years in a row and then finally buy one? Like what do you, what's typical for you?
Or what do you plan on? You'd be surprised. A lot of guys will pull the trigger right there.
Wow. A lot of them have been researching, researching,
but they haven't been able to see one, put their hands on it, right? They see it online.
They see it in brochures. They, you know, they read about it. The guys come up and they'll talk
about forums and things that they've read about the TKX, this and you know, blah, blah, blah.
But when they actually get to see it and they go, well, that is kind of small and that will fit in
my car. And then they get to shift it. And a lot of guys will buy it right then from one of our
distributors. We get an occasional guy that will come back to our three different shows and you'd
be surprised to see a guy, you've seen him at a show in California. And the next thing you know,
you're in Iowa and the guy shows up in Iowa because he's that big of an enthusiast that he's
going to those larger shows, which tells us we're at the right shows, right? Because if guys are
coming to all the different shows, but I would say probably seven out of 10 times a guy is going to
pull the trigger when he sees it. Wow. What's the price range just for people that don't price you
every day? So when you look at the five speed, it's, it's $28.95. When you get into the six speeds,
there's a couple of different variants, right? So it can be anywhere from $33.95 up to $44.95,
just depending on what comes with it. I mean, we make a, we make a specific Magnum XL that's for
Gen 5, so you will see, you know, a little bit higher price range there because we're giving you
all the pieces that go with it, you know, the cross member, the shifter, the clutch, or the
clutch housing. Cool to see such a, I mean, in the life cycle, right? They're reading about it,
they're on the forums, they're getting bad info on Facebook, they're scared, they're not scared,
they put it in their cart, they don't, then they come to the show, meet the guys, do the thing,
and then they're like, yeah, give it to me right now, that's cool. Yeah. And we get guys that,
the guys that come in that are saying, hey, this is a 6TKX, I bought this year. And you're like,
you got six project cars? You know, wow. But yeah, guys are buying them, you know, numerous,
because they've got numerous cars at home. Oh, that's a certain level, you know.
I love it because you can measure, right, you, you immediately know how the show's doing for you,
how your staff's working, how your distributor's working out. Like, give me a couple shows that
come to mind, you're like, I can't wait for this show because I know we do well. Give me a couple.
Mustang Week. We do very well at Mustang Week. We have a lot of customers that show up at Mustang
Week. We do, you know, we do very well when it comes to the power tour. A lot of people don't
think that, you know, they think power tour is all about the drive and all of that, but you'd be
surprised at the, the customers you gain at power tour. And then I think probably one of the largest
shows that everybody thinks is, you know, maybe overwhelming is SEMA. We do well at SEMA. We do
very well at SEMA. I look forward to that show every year. A lot of guys will tell you they hate it
because they're going to walk a lot, but, but the reality is it's a good show for us.
And SEMA is a hard one to be the news of, like it's, there's a trillion products,
but definitely the C8 transaxle, I'm going to call it, what's the actual name of this thing?
It's just a manual transaxle. We're just calling it a manual transaxle display.
All right, the Tremac manual transaxle. I like it when you said C8 in front of it.
Okay. Yeah. I mean, that was the talk of SEMA. Like it was instantaneously that thing spread
everywhere. I was just walking around, people were talking about it and it was like, that was
the product of the year for sure from a enthusiast standpoint. That doesn't happen often, right?
It's cool when it does though. I only seen it happen one other time and that was with TKX.
But outside of that, yeah. I mean, it was. If you've been to our booth at SEMA, our indoor booth,
you know that it's very well attended. A lot of people in there.
All right. So you got an awesome ground game with the floors and your floor at different shows.
Talk about what else you do to market Tremac. Where is attention in the aftermarket right now,
just as a general question. As far as product or as far as where do we...
Where are you marketing and where do you see the most activity to draw attention to your product?
You know, we do some print, but prints really kind of gone away. I mean, we don't do a lot of it.
I mean, it's more digital. If we look at our social channels, they're huge. I mean, we get a lot of
a lot of attention on social.
We don't have to market a lot. I don't want to say that, but we really don't, right? Because we have
a product and we sell it to our distributors and we allow them to market, right? Because they're
the ones that are selling other items that go with it, right? If we have a new product,
will I advertise and do other things? Sure. Like when we did TKX, we put on TV show, we did this,
we did that to get it out there. But yeah, there's not a lot to do that other than shows for us.
We get more in the show world than we do other things.
And then how about, obviously, a ton of racers are going to be listening to this like,
okay, what about sponsorships? What about race car sponsorships? What about I'm an autocrosser?
I'm going on power tour. Where does sponsoring racers, how does that fit into your portfolio?
So I have an application that I send out. So if somebody inquires, I send an application and I
ask them some specific questions and then we get into where are they going to share it? When is
it, are they going to keep the vehicle? Is it going to get auctioned off? All the things that
and is it available for me? If I want to put it in my booth at SEMA or do I want to put it in
the booth at Mustang? Do I want to put in a booth at LS Fest? Can I get that vehicle? So yeah,
I send those out. I tell everybody, because usually we get pretty hard at SEMA and I tell
everybody that send it in to me and then right after January, I start making decisions on which
ones I can do. Obviously, because I have to do my budget for the year, right? And then in January,
they tell me, okay, this is what you have. And then I pick where I'm going to go with certain
things. And what can a racer do to stand out if you're getting a lot of people? Give me an example
of a really successful partnership you've had with a racer. Like they did XYZ and that really
will work with them forever. We have a certain racer right now that runs a Terminator. And I can
tell you that that gentleman posts every week on Facebook and tags Tremac Performance every week.
And you can't ask for more than that. I mean, he's one of those guys that he wants to show
the love for all of his sponsors and he makes sure that he shows that.
That's awesome because we hear a lot about people that like, yeah, I had a sponsorship and they
didn't renew and I don't know what happened. Even though I only went to half the races I said I was
going to and I didn't take any pictures of it and I didn't tag them on anything. It's like, well,
that's what happened. It's easier now for a racer, right? You have an iPhone in your pocket and you
can be your own agency in the good old days of NMRA, right? You had to get in the magazines or you
had to win something and now you can work hard and get on my radar. Well, yeah. And we talked last
part about, you know, went on Sunday, sell on Monday type of thing, but really you don't even
have to do that. You can go to an event and not have a great weekend, but make cool content,
tag the right sponsors. That's doing a lot for the business even if you went home round one.
Absolutely. I'm not looking for the guy who's going to come in and tell me he won every weekend,
right? I won. I won. I won. I mean, that's great. We want that. But I want the guy who's going to
promote Tremac, right? Who's going to say, I got a Tremac in my car and he's proud to say that every
week or every, you know, every time he posts something. And I shouldn't say guy. I should
say guy's and girls because we do sponsor a few girls in the industry as well.
Hey, shout out to the girls. They're doing a much better job of the entire social ecosystem
than the guys I think. The racers who win every weekend are kind of the worst at this.
And I see all female influencers that we've worked with or that I'm associated with,
they're tagging properly. They're making sure to do all that stuff. So it's definitely a good spot to
be in. I'm curious about your thoughts on the aftermarket in the next, I think 12 months is
probably a long time for us now to be talking about some say with three years, but I think that's
just too far out. But what's the next 12 months look like for the automotive aftermarket?
I think for Tremac, it looks very well. I mean, I think it looks really good.
We're actually having a, even though we're only three months into the year, it's started out with
a bang. I mean, it kind of, I don't want to say that it's the same as it was during COVID when
there was free money, right? But we are seeing some increased sales in the aftermarket right now.
Unfortunately, you don't see it in the OE world, but in the aftermarket,
guys are fixing up cars they have, and there's a lot of projects out there.
Can you tell me what you're up your over here?
Well, we're up, you're over.
Double digits?
Yeah, I would say that in the aftermarket.
20%
Maybe 15.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
I mean, 15 is in this market, that's a lot, especially in a declining segment, which we
know it's not, but everyone kind of thinks that it is. That's huge.
What's your insights there? What are you doing that makes you, I would say, outpace the industry,
maybe 3x what the average is right now? What are you doing?
New products.
You have to release something new. If you don't release something new, and it's the same old,
it's just going to die. But you've got to put new products out there. And we have been fortunate
over the last five years that we have put something new, whether it's a new variant
of what we have, or creating the TKX, showing this manual transact, so bringing DCT to the
aftermarket. You haven't asked me about that yet, but there are, you have to bring new things.
If you don't bring new things, you're not going to be there.
When you release a new thing, sometimes people think, well, that's only going to sell more
of that thing. But has it been your experience that releasing a new thing kind of lifts even
old product up? We saw that at Chevy a lot. You would release a new LS and you would
accidentally sell a bunch of big blocks just from the excitement of the thing. So do you see that too?
A little. It's not a huge, right? I mean, but obviously, if you're getting that attention,
you're going to pick up a few of those other items, right? A few other things are going to sell.
All right. Well, you led us to the aftermarket DCT conversation. So go on.
So obviously, if you were at SEMA, you've seen we displayed a 1999 Ford Lightning
with the Predator engine, with our RTR9070 DCT, which came in the GT500.
So we are really, really close to releasing that this year, probably in the third quarter,
that we will have a working functional DCT that can be put into a few other applications.
I'm just imagining now, I'm imagining now that someone builds an aftermarket DCT car,
like a 69 Camaro, and then they sell it, and then that guy swaps in the manual version of the DCT
transaxle, and then you just have this circular economy of swapping them in and out for the
time. This is brilliant, yeah. Because they sold the DCT and they sold the manual, right?
There was a 69 Camaro that was built with the DCT, it was in Kandigat's booth.
That was with our 9070 behind an LS. This is why they're up, because they're making this little
circular economy of swapping DCTs for manuals. Does that come with a whole bunch of electronics?
It comes with our TCU, so we do have our own trans control unit, right?
And no iron harness, but it has to be behind an engine that's electronically controlled,
because we do look for certain things. We need certain things in order to make it work.
This sounds expensive and difficult to tune. Convince me otherwise.
It's not difficult to tune.
It's not difficult to tune, right? I mean, we've done enough work that we have some
Kand calibrations that we can utilize, right? And it works, and we know how to make it work on
just a few signals versus something that has 70 modules in a car. We don't need that anymore to
make it work. We've got it down to where a handful of signals and we can make it work.
Is it expensive? It's a little more expensive than a manual transmission, but you're getting
everything all encompassed into one, right? So now the clutch and everything is all encompassed
into that. You're not buying a clutch. You're not buying a filer. You're not buying this and this
and this. You're buying all of it as one piece. I think he's talked you right into this, hasn't he?
I mean, that sounds pretty good. When my kid says it, it sounds so good.
I mean, I know with the C8 especially, I know we keep talking about C8s, but
there's kind of this like, no, I died. Well, when we had Alan Johnson on there,
we were talking about kind of the maintenance of a DCT and Chevy has like, you got to
change the fluid and the filter before 7500 miles or three years and then now they just took it
off of the newer models. What do people need to know about maintaining one of these things
versus manual trans? Obviously, it's just like an automatic transmission. It's not an automatic,
right? I mean, it is a manual gearbox that is electronically controlled and hydraulically
actuated, but it does have filters in it, right? And we do say, hey, you need to change these
filters and you should change fluids. We've left that to the OEs to decide what that
cycle, what that interval looks like. Obviously, on the Corvettes, there's a small canister filter
on the side. They've told their customers that every 7500 miles, they need to change that canister
filter. It's very inexpensive. It's easy to do. You don't lose any fluid and it's a good piece
of insurance, right? Because there is particles that are floating around in there. I mean,
as gears wear together and lap together, I mean, obviously, you get certain things that come from
that. Contamination can happen and you want to keep that from getting in those solenoids as much as
you possibly can. As a person who's been traumatized by 4L60 automatic transmissions,
especially in the fourth gen world, there was always this kind of lore around, well,
if you haven't changed the transmission fluid and it's working, just don't because it's going to be
even worse with the new fluid in there. So I guess for everyone at home, stay on top of this thing
because you don't want to be the experimenter here. Absolutely. I mean, you should always follow
those maintenance guidelines that come with it. I mean, we didn't just make that up, right? I mean,
it comes from a lot of testing. I mean, you know yourself in the OE world, we do a lot of testing
and we know we're not out there to just try to take your money. We know that you need to do
these things if you want something to last. What they used to call it at GM, this might be
top secret information, but there was a Woodward test they had for the transmissions that they
would do out at Milford. I'm not going to say on the pod what the testing regimen was,
but it was pretty intense, man. What an OE goes through to validate these things.
Brought it out with the fifth gen come around, but it was a lot of burnouts and hard launches,
but that was a stitch of car, right? So that's good. What else you got coming or what are you
looking at, product or market? Like what's in your bag a trick? Because I mean, I'll be very
calm. I'm super impressed with the performance. The brand is out there very strong. You clearly
have a great hold of what product drives the market. You're connecting with the right people.
Like you got a lot of really good things going on at Tremac, so tell me what you do to keep
what's coming next so we can keep an eye on you. Sure. I mean, obviously we talked about
the manual transition, so we talked about the DCT. But what we haven't had on is the Magnum XL
coming out with a gear position sensor. And we did that specifically because guys that wanted
to do their 19 and up Mustangs, right? If they want to get rid of the transmission that came
in the car originally and put a Tremac Magnum in it, now you have a gear position sensor that
now your camera works and rev matching works and everything works in that vehicle.
I'm excited to try to do that technology on other models, right? Because there's a lot of cool
things you can do when you know what gear you're in. Boost by gear, just having an indicator on
your dash and things that people wish they had today. Just for reference, Justin, there were
many times I've driven a manual transmission car and I had no idea what gear I was in,
just as a point for Mike. That's why you're not allowed to drive them anymore.
I still have one, but I can tell you a story. I told somebody they need to upshift and they told
me, well, it's up. It's already up. And I'm like, no, no, you need to go to the next gear.
Yeah. And then I said, well, you need to downshift. It was already down. And I'm like, no, no, no,
that's not what I'm referring to. You need to go down the gear or come up a gear.
I'll give Mike my pitch here early. I'll be an early pitcher. I have a 6060 in a fourth gen
single turbo Trans Am. And we would love to know what gear we were in for boost by gear and for
all that stuff. So if you need a prototyper, you know, if you want to sponsor me, I will tag
him. I'm going to tag a hashtag. I got it. I already know how to do this. So one post a week.
I could do that easily. And I do want to point out Mike is the only person we've had on the pod
who already brought us merch. So technically, we're already sponsored by Tremac. So this would
just be an extension of the sponsor. She knows how to warm us up, like shows up with a bag full
of shirts, hats. Yeah, it's like Tremac everywhere in here. No one's brought me anything but my
kids. So it goes right to the top of the list. Mike, give us an idea of what's the best way to
find your products. I know you get a distribution path, but somebody hears this, maybe they want
to talk to you, but they want more information on the product. Where do we find Tremac?
Sure. I mean, obviously Tremac.com, right? I mean, that's where you're going to get
the most bang for your buck to go in there. You can go there. You can click on it and send a message
to us. But we also have an 800 number, 800-401-9866. When you call that number, you're going to go
directly to the guys that work the tech line and they can get you, if they want to speak to me,
those guys can easily transfer them over to me. I love that. The amount of business owners, when
you ask them what their phone number is for the tech line or the shop, they can't get it.
So to be able to just rattle off means you are in fact expecting people to call and you would
like them to do that, which is great. We want them to call, right? We want to stay engaged with
our customer and sell more product. Your list of shows this year is the High Performance Expo.
Can you give me a few lines about HPX and your anticipation there and what a new trade show
means to you and the automotive aftermarket? I'm excited about it because it is about racing,
right? I mean, it's in the racing capital. I mean, in what better place to bring this
manual transaxle to and show that, right? So yeah, I'm excited about that to actually go.
I mean, we've all done other racing shows, but this one kind of stands out. I mean,
it's sitting right in the heart of NASCAR country. Well, I'm going to be in the booth
trying to figure out how to fit one of these in my C8 project I've been working on.
Mike, this has nothing to do with anything we've talked about, but I needed to ask someone who
knows what they're talking about. If I'm driving my car and I'm sitting in a red light, is it bad
if I just have the clutch in while I'm sitting there or should I put it in neutral every time
and clutch out? Does it matter to the transmission? Who cares about this?
Six of one, half dozen of another, right? I mean, it really is. Are you sitting there and
you're holding the clutch out to where it's holding the vehicle in that position?
No, I would never do that.
But you know what I'm saying, right? I mean, there are people that do that, right? And they're,
well, my clutch is burned up. Well, I wonder why. You know, personally, I put my car in neutral at the
light, but that's just a practice for me. And, you know, I've been, I think you mentioned at
the beginning, I mean, my time at Tremac and the time work for a distributor, I've been,
you know, 43 years in this business. So putting my car in neutral is just a habit for me. I've
drove so many test vehicles over the years that I do that. And, you know, it's experience of the
driver, in my opinion.
See, I just don't want to get beat off the line by some like rando minivan. So I'm, I'm ready.
I'm staged out. I'm ready to go. I don't want to get caught like, oh no, we're going. Oh no,
there was a drag race I didn't know about. So I stay ready. Mike's in there. He doesn't care.
He's just cruising, but I'm ready.
I get the guy next to me, Reverend is engine looking and nothing, you know, and I'm just like...
The problem here in Detroit is that minivans run nights. That's what people don't understand.
So you got to be ready for these. Yeah. And there could be a Hellcat anywhere coming from any zone
you don't know. You got to be ready. So that was mine. That's what I wanted to know. Now I know.
It sounded like the way I do it is lame or the way Mike does it, but you know, it's whatever.
All right. It's official. The C8 kit is coming soon, everybody. And that's the pod.
About this episode
TREMEC aftermarket chief Mike explains why the SEMA “C8 manual transaxle” buzz is real but not quite what people assume. The billet unit is a prototype manual transaxle meant for multiple applications, with early 2027 physical units targeted. He breaks down TREMEC’s aftermarket lineup (TKX leading, Magnum and T5 still strong), why manuals are down in new cars yet still thriving in swaps, and how they balance OEM durability needs with enthusiast feel. Marketing strategy centers on interactive show displays and stick-shift drag events, plus upcoming DCT and Magnum XL tech.
Original notes
The Tremec Manual Transaxle stopped SEMA cold. Phones are ringing off the hook. And yet... the Corvette world isn't sure what to believe.In this episode of Automotive Advantage, we sit down with Mike Kidd, Aftermarket Business Unit Manager at Tremec, to get the straight story on the manual transaxle that became the most talked-about Corvette product and why the internet's assumptions about it being a factory C8 option were dead wrong.Mike sets the record straight, breaks down what this transmission actually is, who it's built for, and when you can get your hands on one. We also dig into why manual transmissions are dying in production vehicles but why the aftermarket demand has never been stronger.What We Cover:* The C8 Manual Transaxle: How fake is it?* Why Tremec built it (and what it's NOT)* When can you actually buy one? (The 2027 timeline)* What else can it fit? GT500, GTD, and beyond* Manual transmissions are down to 2% of production vehicles — here's why that's a lie* Why a C7 Grand Sport manual is worth $10–15K more than an automatic right now* Tremec's full product lineup: TKX, Magnum, T5, and the new aftermarket DCT* How Tremec uses vehicle registration data to spot market opportunities* 37 shows a year: how Tremec wins the floor at SEMA, Power Tour, and Mustang Week* How to get a Tremec sponsorship (and what actually gets you renewed)🔗 Find Tremec:Website: tremec.comTech Line: 800-401-9866Automotive Advantage is the podcast for automotive aftermarket owners, operators, and builders who take the business side of this industry seriously. New episodes drop weekly.🔔 Subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.👍 If this was useful, leave us a like, it helps other serious automotive professionals find the show.#C8Corvette #ManualTransmission #Tremec #CorvetteGrandSport
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