BoxeDK

My old tranny gave up on me in febuary. Lots of metal in oilpan and no gears. It had 157.000 miles on it and definitely a hard life on it. So I started to look for a new tranny on the internet from anywhere else than Denmark. The prices on a 4L60 here would be about $2000 for a rebuild, without converter, and not even stronger than a stock tranny.

I must admit that I was a little skeptical about buying a transmission from MadDog Transmissions, because of the bad reviews from the past some years ago. But after some research I found out that Lou replaced most (if not all) of his old crew who practilly fooled him to make their own, new company look better. But I am all about giving people a chance... And as far as I could find on the internet, he had not a single complain about transmission builded the last 2-3 years, that he at least didn't fixed right away. All complains were from trannys build by the "old crews" back untill 2006-2007 I think..

So here we go...

In the middle of April, I decided to order a 4L60 from Mad Dog. He asked what vehicle and what kind of driving I was up to... It was for my daily driver, but I liked to step on the pedal from time to time, streetracing for fun. Also told him what mods on the car was done.
For my application he suggested a level 2, with heavy duty converter. That would be more than enough for me..

Last in april I ordered the transmission from Lous shop in Georgia, to Gadstrup in Denmark. He gave me a very good price on the shipping, and the email from TNT with Track&Trace number was send to my email, also with the emails between Mad Dog and TNT...
I could see that Lou was charged more money for the shipping by TNT, that Lou charged me. But he mentioned nothing about that. He stood up by his price he gave me. Good guy...

TNT f***ed up very hard thou.. Even the right adress was printed on the box, they managed to send the transmission to Malaga in Spain instead of Copenhagen in Denmark. 3000km in the wrong direction. Told Lou about it and his assistent Chris, worked hard and fast to get the transmission to Denmark in a hurry.

Meanwhile I was writing with "spaindom" from this website, as he was alsp ordering a transmission from Lou. It seems like TNT screwed up and was sending spaindom's tranny to Denmark, and my transmission to Spain, because they gave the two boxes the same barcode and track&trace number. But last week it all worked out and we both got our transmissions.

Here is how it is shipped. On a pallet in a woodbox
http://postimage.org/image/gfjnnz6ut/

TNT came with my transmission last week, but it seemed like they didn'e handled the freight with caution. The transmission was tilted a little to the one side of the box, and was ripped loose from the fixed portition even it had some metalband to hold it in place.

Pictures here:
http://postimage.org/image/uo55fx8zb/
http://postimage.org/image/4zk2yvyfv/
http://postimage.org/image/vn8tztdh1/

Told Lou about it because I was afraid that the tranny was damaged. He told me just to relax and install the transmission. If anything was wrong, he would take care of it right away...

So yesterday I'd make the tranny swap with help from a friend. We have done a lot of car repairs, but not on US cars. So just to make sure everything was done properly we used this manual for advice:
http://modernmusclecars.net/forums/a...p?do=tcinstall
(If links to other sites are not allowed in here, any moderators or admins may delete this)

The swap took about 6-7 hours. Pretty good time for 2 people never done this on a US car before.
There was some trouble thou, because there was no speedsensor sprocket on the shaft on the new tranny.

Here you can see the speedsensor sprocket on old shaft:
http://postimage.org/image/asyqd821j/

And here you can see there is no sprocket on the new shaft:
http://postimage.org/image/tiexmcotz/

We didn't know how to move it from one tranny to the other, but figured out to warm it up and pull it off the old tranny. Then warm it up ALOT to size it up, and then fast put it on the shaft on the new tranny before it cooled down. Took about 1½ hours to figure that out, heheh...
But it all went smooth and before we knew it the car was assembled..

We did remember to flush the oilcooler lines, and the oil cooler before assembled the system. And also maked sure that the converter was properly in place on the 2 shafts, and into the oilpump.
Also the TV cable was reseted to factoy default by Mad Dogs own manual howto do it:
http://www.maddogtransmissions.com/v.../tv_cables.pdf
"Tight like a guitar string..."

So we took the car down from the lift, and poured 4 liters of Dexron 3 in it. Started the engine and poured about 2 liters more in to fill up to level standards. Looked under the car and no leaks were spotted. Tested all gear shifts with engine on while still lifted on the rearwheels to allow them to turn. Gearshifts went fine.
The testdrive showed that the RPM should almost max out before it would shift into 2 gear. So back to the garage.

Went on the internet and found this site:
http://www.tvmadeez.com/article/index.php
(Sorry again if this link is not allowed on LS1tech.com)

Read part 1-3 and all of the TV cables/valves function is now very clear to me. I had a too tigt cable.
Since my cable is the original from 1992, it didn't adjust itself as easy it should when pushed down the gas pedal. And after I readjusted the cable to get the right function of the TV valve,
THIS TRANSMISSION WORKS FLAWLESS..!

I haven't stepped on it WOT yet, because of the 250-300 mile break-in time. But it shifts very well, softly when cruising, and with 50% throttle it shift very firm and quickly.

I haven't told Lou yet how things went with this transmission, but I know he also looks on this page ;-)

My conclusion for now, is that I have a transmission from MadDog Transmission that works very well, and the service I've got from this company has gotten 5 STARS! Every time I have contaced them, I got service like I was the only customer, and they had all the time in the world to explain things to me..

My advice to Mad Dog Transmission is to use another shipping company than TNT. Google "TNT express review" and you will find nothing good about them. And spaindom from this site, and my self, are now to more unhappy people about TNT services. So Lou; You really need to use some other freight company.

Otherwise everything has been good so far. 4 out of 5 stars to Mad Dog Transmission, from here. He would get 5 stars if another freightcompany was used. Maybe that will happen in the future? :-)
And if that speedsensor sprocket was already installed on the shaft. (I don't know if that should already be a part of a new rebuild tranny or you have to put it on yourself) But we managed to fix it with no trouble. Just alot of time used.

But all in all, I am very happy with my tranny and I will have no worries about buying from Mad Dog again. Will order a rebuild kit soon to rebuild my old transmission...

I will keep this thread updated every month or so, how this transmission works out..

Cheers, BoxeDK

SnIpEz

iTrader: (4)

300 mile break in period? You should not have to break in that trans

BoxeDK

I know there is alot of different opinions about that. To be honest, I don't know what to believe.. So just to be safe, I'll do the break-in milage. Already got 100 miles on it today :-) Should be on 300 miles in the beginning next week.. (I am on vacation so got alot of time driving around)

When should I do an oil/filter change the first time on a new rebuild?

maddoglou454

Hey my man! I am glad everything worked out great with the swap! Again I am sorry about TNT, I was assured everything was going to go very smoothly with international shipment but I guess i was wrong. Just FYI I am looking into a few international freight companies that have a much better trust with there customers in the market place. We should know soon.

Thanks again man!

BoxeDK

First 300 miles on it now. Have been beating it a some today with a couple of races.
It shifts perfect and works like a charm :-)

Even got a ticket from police. That means the car is not fast enough, hehe.


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BoxeDK

580 miles on it now, and I decided to do an oil change to clean out any possible dirt there might be.
The oil was clean with no dirt and no metalparts :-)
But new filter and dexron 3 is now in the tranny...


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Boo"SS"t

iTrader: (2)

I'm curious, what car is this in and what mods?

BoxeDK

It is a Chevy C1500 extended cab short bed, with a 350 V8. With Edelbrock airfilter and 3" true dual Magnaflow system.
I don,t know which mods else made on this. It puts 255hp on the wheels... Has 210 stock.

It is my daily driver but do some streetraces in the weekends.


Posted from LS1Tech.com App for Android

BoxeDK

The new tranny has a little over 1200 miles on it now.
And I have been beating the sh*t out of it the last couple of weekends...

It seems like since the first time I raced it for a whole day, it have been running even better and more the way I like it. Maybe there was some kind of break-in period...(?)

Smooth shifting from 0-25% throttle.
Very firm and quickly shifts with about 30-60% throttle
60-90% throttle almost gives a whiplash..
100% throttle = Black tiremarks on road when shifts

Another update in a month...
Cheers...

BoxeDK

Another month has past now and the tranny has a little over 2000 miles on it.
Took the car on a 300 km trip last week with no stop. No problems at all with the tranny.

I am still very happy with it.

1 question thou:
As times go and mileage too, the converter feels like it has increased stall speed some. Not much. Talking about 100-200rpm at max. Is this normal?

JRENIGAR

iTrader: (37)

Good review, Im personally glad to hear this about Mad Dog Transmissions. Hopefully someone with a ls powered car making decent ( 450-600 ) rwhp can give a review showing their trans to be a well built unit also.

BoxeDK

Try send a message to spaindom from this website. He ordered a level 3 from Lou the same time I'd ordered my tranny.



Posted from LS1Tech.com App for Android

jk iron man

My experience is this is by far one of the worst companies to buy from. I bought a transmission from them 10/08/15 and I currently have no transmission or the $1,440. To start I received the transmission on 11/8/15 almost a month late. I install the transmission only to have it last not even ten miles on the test drive. The transmission reverted to neutral and would not shift to any other gear. I call the company they instantly assume the transmission was installed wrong (apparently its rocket science to install a transmission even with a transmission jack/proper tools). I send the transmission back on 1/11/16 on my dime ($200) and ask them to get an other one coming for my now royally pissed off customer (which they agree to do but failed to uphold that agreement). I get a call from them telling me nothing was wrong. I ask about the new one they shipped and was told one had not been shipped yet. Now its about 4 months and I had to go buy a transmission from a different company to save the relationship with the customer. I ask for my money back since I no longer need their product. I was then told I voided the warranty, because had to put an after market adapter plate on the transmission so it would bolt to the vehicles engine and transfer case. I ended up ordering a Jasper transmission and everything is great the vehicle now has 5k miles. I put the same adapter plate on the jasper transmission as the mad dog transmission had and on the test drive everything worked perfect. I have been not only insulted but hung up on along with being bounced around and then had the call "dropped". This company is very good at making you feel less of a human being. It's sad when you can't even have a conversation with the guy you paid $1,4400 to because he was never taught how to treat others with respect.

mrvedit

We are sorry to hear that.
While the OP seemed to be happy, receiving a good working transmission from MadDog seemed to the exception and not the rule.
Interesting to see that MadDog is not only no longer a sponsor here, but even Banned.
It was obvious to the Admins that MadDog was paying people to post positive reviews - a brand new member posts one super-glowing positive review and is never hear from again. Good riddance.

The current sponsors for transmissions, FLT, RPM and PerformaBuilt have a great reputation here as do the converter sponsors, Yank, FTI and CircleD.

SesiomSummers

well I bough the top 4L80 you can get from them, for a 408 LSA engine (01`Z28) so far the tran and the converter been working perfect, of course I did a brake in period and I take care of my car to abid any Overstress situations on the drivetrain... dont want to Judge on people with bad experiences with Mad Dog but... I seen people just Destroyng their trans because they think it can hold miss uses like launches from neutral to drive, shift to Reverse wile going foward, over Reved down shifts, and the worst of all put in parking wile the car is moving ... and more stuff like that... My trans was made to old more than enouh power but that doesnt mean will handle stupidity and lack off common sence... just my 02.

BigGoom

iTrader: (1)

So is this place a yay or a nay?

Jeremy@RPMTransmissions

iTrader: (12)

Do yourself a favor and do a quick google search. It will tell you everything you need to know.

SesiomSummers

This is more like buy under your own Risk... Mine is working good, but after all Ive seen is ... kinda uncomftable felling that your trans may blow any second, to be honest Im tempted to travel to Jake`s performances in Orlando and made him check if my top of the line 4l80 is what it is... Im really gratefull with MadDod so far but Im ready to call my Layer if this is just a stock 4l80 with beauty parts... If I where you I would contact Monster or any other and get a quote... Low seems to be a good guy but... his company is not trustworthy.

hope this helps!

SesiomSummers

OK WHY ON EARTH every time Mad Dog is mentioned people with only 1 or 2 post here to 1. TRASH him or 2. Love him.... this is so full of drama!!! who need Telemundo and mexican soap operas when you have this!

mjs1012

iTrader: (36)

Funny how you talk about others trashing the guy, but it's obvious you don't trust what you have because you want to have other shops open the trans up and you're ready to "call your lawyer".