I just had my 700r4 rebuilt, I put it in and hooked everything back up and test drove it yesterday. I ran it with like 5 quarts of trans fluid for about half a mile and it took like 3500 to 4000 rpms to move at all, then it started smoking and I stopped and put more in. I filled it up correctly and ran it. It seemed like the shifts were soft, even though the guy said he drilled it to shift like a shift kit. When I got up this morning, I figured it was just that the tv cable wasnt adjusted correctly. So, I fixed that and its still doing basically the same, except it downshifts at WOT now like its supposed to. plus, when I'm cruising, its at like 2100 RPM's the whole time. Is that normal? It's still not working exact. Help anyone?

Hmmm..... sounds very, very bad to me...

A freshly rebuilt 700 should hold about 11 quarts of fluid. If you ran it with 5 quarts and it started smoking, I think you likely just shot a transmission, over $6 worth of fluid that you should have added.

Check the fluid and make sure that it is now full, correctly.If it doesn't work right, take it back to the guy who built it, and tell him what happened; be honest, don't try to leave out what you really did, hopefully he'll take pity on you. If you try to snow him, the minute he tears it back down he'll see exactly what happened to it; and it's real hard to re-establish somebody's good will after he catches you in the act of trying to screw him.

If the converter was empty, you took off 6 quarts shy of being full. Being 3 quarts low can damage the tranny, let alone 6. How far did you drive?

Initially, the torque converter had some fluid in it. Not sure how much, but it was very heavy and I could see fluid in it. Then I put 4 quarts in. I only drove third of a mile at the most. Didnt go past maybe 30 miles an hour. Then put about 4 more quarts in. Do you really think its shot? It doesnt act like it did, now that its full. It will move as soon as I hit the throttle, but just on open road, it seems to be a little high reved at cruising speeds (about 2,000 rpms) and the engine seems to heat up kinda quickly. Plus it sometimes just doesnt feel like it shifts when it should. I also didnt drop the pan to put in the tv cable. I just pulled the little hook up out the case and hooked the cable to it, droped down, and bolted the housing back down to the transmission.

are you sure your not talking pints? 11 quarts is almost three gallons of atf... It would be a tad overfilled if im not mistaken. When i emptied my converter and changed the fluid during my engine swap i remembered it taking something like 1 3/4 of a gallon or around 16 pints. The capacity of the trans is listed as being 11 pints.

if you dumped in 5 quarts and still had some fluid in the converter it might have been close to full. Did you check the dipstick with the engine idleing (like the instructions say on the dipstick), Or with the engine off?

Whatever the trans fluid comes in (whether it be pints or quarts) like you would buy at autozone. and the thing is that when I put the tranny back in, I had a hard time getting the dipstich down the engine compartment and in the tranny. Finally I got it in but still ahd about half an inch sticking out that should have went in. So I based the dipstich as if it says that its low, then its full cause thats about a half inch difference. And no, I had the engine shutoff at the time of checking.

gotta check it with the front pump (and engine) going, atf circulateing and teh converter filled. The trans was probably pretty low on fluid.

No, its QUARTS. Don't you think that if all you did was pull the pan and drain the TC and it took 16 pints, that 11 for a DRY transmission would need a little more than 11 pints? It takes 5 QUARTS just to refill after a filter change, then add on about 4 quarts from the converter, and another quart or two to fill in all the piston, accumulator , pump and valvebody cavities.
And specifications list 11 Quarts Dry with a 298mm Torque converter. I have the Hydramatic manual, the '85 F-car factory service manual, and '86 F-car factory service manual, the '90 F-car factory service manual and the '91 F-car factory service manual all in front of me and they agree

Thanks GM... I'm usually so full of excrement, nobody ever believes a word I say, but I'm married and have kids so you'd think I'd be used to it by now

That wouldn't bother me, my cars drive just fine