I was wondering if the torque converters changed from year to year. I just put a 700r4 from a 83 Firebird into my Trans Am which had a 87 700r4. I used my converter from the 87 and now the car stays in park no matter what gear I put it in. I also hear a sound that sounds like I have a blower on the engine. The sound seems to be coming from the front part of the transmission. When I bolted the flex plate to the TC I noticed that the TC moved foreword to meet the flex plate.

The spline count on the input shaft changed between 83 and 84. The converter from the 87 won't work on your 83 transmission.

Ok I was afraid of that. Did I wreck anything by putting the wrong converter on?

The splines on the input shaft or the converter might have taken a little damage, but I wouldn't really think so. You should be able to look and see when you take it apart again.

thank you for your help

Ouch!

Thats weird how it would even all go together...

that sucks, know how you feel. at least you got some experience swapping parts around.

better luck next time!

Not that weird. There are fewer splines on the early ones because the input shafts are a smaller diameter. If he'd tried to put an early converter on a later transmission it wouldn't have gone together.

I guess that makes sense.


I imagine that thing spinning around on the input shaft at mach1 would be pretty hard on the splines!

Can he not just swap out the whole shaft? Or did gm decide they didnt want those to interchange?

By the time you've done that, you've torn the whole transmission down to get at it. Easier just to get a torque converter that fits.

Got the correct converter on now it runs great. No damage that I could see. I will never do that again!

Awesome, good to see their was little-no damage!