[Nas Escobar]

For the record, BabyBlue had a 6 speed swap that got wrecked, but he got another one and had the conversion done bad by Milzy IIRC. I remember the clutch pedal ended up disconnected.

Just thought THAT should be mentioned because it happened recently (last year).

I would go WOT Tech over Milzy unless you're getting something off the shelf from him. I'm also pretty sure your local speed shop could install the parts if they have experience with conversions. Trans swaps are fairly common. It's the cars that are specific but the ideas are the same. Just know that WOT Tech is in Florida and Milzy is in Indiana.

As far as the manual swap, you might have to look for Grand Ams with a swap if you want to go 5 speed. There's more modded Grand Ams than Aleros sadly. Aleros barely have a following compared to the Grand Am. They're the same car, just different end clips and interiors. Mechanicals are the same.

6 speed is the more popular option, as evidenced by the 3 members here, but you can also get a Getrag 282 or F23. The Getrag may be more common to find since they slapped that onto the 2.8 MPFI and later 3.1 MPFI on a lot of cars. They were used in J bodies, FWD A bodies and W bodies. Easier find, but you would have to source the pedal, cable and other tidbits from a 5 speed 4 banger Grand Am or Alero. F23 has to have the same bellhousing as your V6, which would be the LN2 2.2 liter Cavalier engine, if they even had it for that engine before it was discontinued. I know at one point they used an Isuzu 5 speed. Long story short, stick to the G6 6 speed. It's well documented anyways.

As far as the centric rings, they're plastic rings that you put on the hub so the wheel doesn't move around when you mount em. The aftermarket wheel is going to have a hub bore that's bigger than your factory's hub. The ring makes the wheel hub centric instead of lug centric. Hub centric is desirable over lug centric. GM's hub size is 70.3. You need an adapter to whatever your hub is. Also, you CANNOT use a wheel with a smaller hub without getting it bored out or using adapters. That means stuff like the import wheels are off limits.