Rockin-Iroc

My 700R4 in a 1986 IROC-Z Camaro has 186,000 miles on it and has never needed any work. For the past 60,000 miles, it's had a strong 355 engine in front of it, with a 2200 rpm stall converter.

My son likes to come home on leave and beat the crap out of it, mostly without me knowing about it, but this last time when it didn't shift so well, he admitted that he was doing a lot of drifting, brake stands, and burnouts with it. What it was doing at first was being real slow to go into higher gears, mostly when it was cold, but it was slowly getting worse over the past month. Then last week, during a relatively hard take off to catch up with traffic, it wouldn't shift gears anymore until almost redline. And then it shifts with a violent BAM!

I'm thinking it's the fluid pump, since that's what controls shifting on this transmission, and they didn't upgrade from the 7-vane pump until the following year. And if that's the case, my nice expensive torque converter probably needs cutting open and cleaning out too.

Anyone really knowledgeable about these trannies want to take a shot at any further diagnosis? Thanks.

BTW, my son won't be driving my car anymore. He can tear up his own car!!!

Rockin-Iroc

One other thing, the fluid is still red, is still full, and is not burnt at all. The fluid appears normal.

It will shift into third but I have not tried to see if it goes into 4th.

Floor guy

The exact failure would be very hard to guess. With that high mileage, I would simply rebuild it. If unit must come out and be dissasembled, rebuild is probably the most practical solution.

StaticVertigo

iTrader: (-1)

id say its the governor before the pump...if the tranny always shifts *** awful hard the cetrifugal weights on the governor could be sticking then releasing causing a suddon pressure surge.

governor controls line pressure, besides, the pumps main job is to fill the torque converter.....the pump doesnt regulate pressure...

3.8TransAM

Or it finally lost the TV cable or stretched the wazoo out of it.

Same thing will occur, trans will not shift normally, but at or near redline when the gov'nor forces the shift.

Check basics, like fluid level and color and the TV cable setting. See if anything changes.

later
Jeremy

Rockin-Iroc

I've checked the fluid, it's fine. I can check the TV cable. Which way lowers the shift point, by shortening it or lengthening it? I can never seem to remember.

It doesn't explain the whining sound though. That to me seems to point to something in the transmission. If the governor is causing that, then I can understand. If the pump went bad, I can understand that too. But TV cable length I don't think would cause the sound.

Thanks for the inputs!

Rockin-Iroc

You know, there's another symptom, come to think of it. Over the past month, just since I've started having trouble with the transmission, I'd be cruising along on the highway in lock up mode and it would intermittently switch out of lock up and light the check engine light, just for a split second, and then go back to normal. This usually happened when it was very cold outside. We have been having near zero temperatures a lot over the past month. When I tried to pull up the codes, all I got was a code 12, which is something like "no input to the ECM". That's about as vague as hell.

Does this have any bearing to the symptoms of my transmission failure?

flaming-ford

iTrader: (7)

not trying to stick up for your son i'm 17 and beat mine more than i'd admit to but, with almost 200k on the tranny and from sitting in front of a hefty 355 it was definetly ready to go.

Btw like i said i'm not sticking up for your son just voicing my opinion. I also wouldn't let him drive it if he were doing brake stands and drifts and doughnuts with my car lol....

Rockin-Iroc

You know you're right. It had to go sooner or later. It's just like if my father had a Chevelle or something when I was a kid, I probably would have gotten a little power happy and done the same thing.

I did tell him about it, but I didn't needle him any more than that.
I'll just have to build it stronger this time.

hiphop

Correction, The govenor does not regulate mail line pressure. The governor regulates governer pressure. Main line pressure is regulated via a seperate valve in the valve body. The pump is what provides line pressure but it is regulated not by the governer.