Well a friend and I rebuilt my 700r4 over the weekend and now we've run in to some problems. It's a HD kit with TransGo reprogramming kit

First of all.... at first it would shift 1-3 great. Drove it around easy about 100 miles or so breaking it in and when I finally went over say 1/4 throttle it seemed like 2nd had a slip. We also NEVER could get it in to 4th. All shifts were firm 1-3 and I was pretty excited to get a couple hundred miles on it and get after it.

150 miles on it now and I barely got on it and it slipped right through second. 1st and 3rd will hold just fine and the shift from 2-3 is very firm. It seems the shift from 1-2 has lightened up and now it just slips in.

Driving tonight out of nowhere I completely lost 2nd gear. Before it would stay in gear as long as I slowly accelerated up to shift in to 3rd.

Now our thinking is there is either something wrong with the shift kit, or something wrong with the servo. We took it to a friend that is VERY good with transmissions and the first thing he said was the valvebody.

This doesn't suprise me. Transgo's instructions were pretty crappy for the valvebody, and I didn't like how the plugs in the seperator plate just ''fit''. I also wasn't real thrilled with drilling the valvebody, but did it as instructed, and every drill came out good. We're thinking a plug was leaking and/or came out. Also none of us could figure out the point of setting a check ball on top of a plug.

Also, with this reprogramming kit, shouldn't it hold gears no matter what RPM they are? Thats the impression I got. Say you put it in 2nd and roll up to a light. It will downshift to 1st and shift up to 2nd at a higher rpm. I was thinking this would be like a full manual where it would hold 2nd at a dead stop if you wanted it to. This along with the sudden loss of 2nd make me wonder about the valve body.

Sorry for the huge post. I'll be pulling the valve body monday when I can get it up on the lift and looking through all of it again I guess. For now I've parked i worrying about messing up the clutches.

 

I have installed hundreds of these kits, and have sold many many more with very few problems. Have you talked to Trans-Go on this? 626 4437451 8-5 PST. Ask for Dave.

 

no the trans-go doesnt make it a full manual. Holding a gear means, if you put it in a manual gear such as 1 2 or 3 it will hold that gear until you shift it.

 

It sounds like you have a problem with the servos and you have probably hurt the band as well. When it didn't work like it should you should have stop driving it.

 

Yes Unfortunatly since you have now lost second you will probably be going back into the transmission , at the very least to replace the band and possibly the drum it rides on .
The Transgo kit is and excellent kit ,I have used it many times but it does take great care when installing ,
When you goto fi it if you need any help please let us know , And in the future and this is not just for you but anyone , If when you install a kit, rebuild a trans, or even get one from a vendor and it isnt doing something right , stop driving imediatly and address the issue , It may save you much time , money and effort ,

 

We basically stopped driving it, took it to get an opinion and that's it. I have a DD that I use instead.

How did your guys' plugs fit in? What did you do you get them to stay?

If it's just the valve body or band I'm really not worried about it. From what everyone has told me, they say it's something in the valve body.

I can lift it, pull the tranny, exchange bands, and have it back in in a couple hours. That really isn't a problem.

 

We will be glad to help contact us while your working to fix it and we can help

 

Im interested in how you got the plugs in the seperator plate. What is your method of getting them to stay? I want to see if we did it right or not

I'm wanting to keep this same shift kit and hopefully just find a problem because I like how this is set up. Also I want to stay with this shift kit because I already drilled the holes in the valve body and etc.

EDIT: this is Flash at a friends house.

 

The plugs in that kit are made of dead soft aluminum. You are supposed to place the plug in the hole, place the plate on a hard flat smooth surface and tap the plug with a hammer. This expands the plug in the hole. It wont come out. The problem you are having sounds more like whats been described above. When you went to adjust the band clearance with the supplied thin washers, you could have torn a sealing ring. Seen it happen a few times. Best guess.

Mec

 

Good, I'm glad we did that right. That's exactly what we did.

Not sure, I guess I'll pull it apart monday and see what the deal is.

 

You are supposed to take a 3/8" - 1/2" drill bit to chamfer the hole, then install the aluminum plug, smack it with a hammer, grind flat, or it will fall out, or the plug will interfere with the valve body to case, causing cross leaks, which can lead to all kinds of problems, and possibly destroy the transmission.

 

I feared something like this.. the instructions I got said nothing like this. All it said was ''plug the holes using the supplied plugs''.

I am hoping that the problems I'm experiencing are related to cross leaks, and etc. I think I'm going to pull the valvebody tomorrow and put in a stock one to see if that fixes my problems.

 

i was the builder of the tranny, first day we took it out. it shifted hard like it should for a nice shift kit, and it shifted through all the gears except we noticed no 4th unless you were on the highway and out of the gas and shifted into 3rd then the rpm would jump. but next day it was shifting but 2nd gear would slip out and then after while no 2nd at all. any last minuters that may think different than me. i for one think pull the valvebody and check the plate. if nothing there move to the servo. if nothing there then i guess its out again. ALSO: the little 3 blockoff plates installed in the seperator plate well i think them are what fucked up. what i didnt get is the checkballs. there are 2 in the VB according to the manual that came with the shift kit. but they sit right on where the blockoff plates when. the 2 round ones. and i am trying to figure that out. the purpose of that checkball is to blockoff the part that is already blocked by the plate. will someone please tell me what transgo did on this jobber.