So I spent the past year building a car. It was an auto car, and I was going to convert it to a stick. everyone said 'try the auto, you will love it'..

I'm not impressed.. With the 2800 stall converter, cc306 cam, 10;1, and 3.54:1 rear end it has no sack from a stop. If you mash it the revs go up then it pulls. (conveter?).

I wish I went with a stick..

I doubt it's an engine power output issue. Engine in sig, but i'm running a lot of advance, no knock. Revs fine, just doesn't pull. either the converter or the tranny slips..

-- Joe

 

That's not a lot of stall for that much cam.

 

as it is it seems it revs way too high. If I put more converter in it, it would be obnoxious to drive on the street i'd think.. like when I drive it, it SOUNDS a lot faster than it's going.. you get 'roaaaaaaaaarrrr' but it doesn't put you in the seat..

-- Joe

 

if you know how check the line press of the tranny. it sounds like a slipping problem either in the trans or converter. what brand of converter is it.

 

Raptor 5x from PATC..

It could also be TV detent. I'm looking at a gear calculator. when I was driving it yesterday, I left it in drive (didnt shift manually). I'm not even 100% sure it kicked down into 2nd when I throttled it.

Looking at the chart, in 3rd gear (drive) at 32mph (what I was going), thats 1500 rpm. when I was throttling it the converter probably was flashing to stall in third gear. I wonder if I manually dropped it lower like to 2nd if it would have been better....

I installed a transgo shift kit so in theory I should be able to drop it into any gear at any mph..

The 'suck' is my digital dash is broken, so only the first digit of my tach lights up. so I can't tell the difference between 3000 rpm and 3900 rpm. both show up as just '3 ' with the second digit out.

-- Joe

 

What diameter is your converter? A smaller converter will be less "slippery" under part throttle starts.

 

get that tv cable right and it's always good to know what kind of line press you have. mine is at 120-140psi. yours should be close.

 

9".

When I bought it, everyone 'said' the raptox 5x is the way to go. Was $560..

" Power Raptor Lock-up " This is a 9 inch converter with a 12 inch lock-up carbon fiber clutch rated up to 700 horse power. Can be ordered in stall speeds of 2600 to 4000 RPM. We stock 2600, 2800, 3000 and 3200. Lower 60 foot times and improved quarter mile times, an average of 1/2 second reduction! The Ultimate Top of the Line Lock-Up Converter. #5X Cost $560.00"


http://www.transmissioncenter.net/700MegaRaptor.htm


-- Joe

 

That sounds about like what you want, then.

 

Under light throttle the converter is slipping so it won't seem that powerfull, but that should change when you floor it. If it seems lazy until a certain RPM and then takes off it means the engine needs more stall speed.

If that cam is the soild 306 it is about 250 @ .050 and in a 350 it would like the 3200 you show they offer, and would be better off with 3600+.

Rob

 

It's a hydraulic roller, 230/244, .510/.540, 112lsa 110ctr.

The more i think of it, I think it's TV tension. When I floor it, it should downshift. It isn't... It hits softer than my '02 S10. With the transgo, that thing should hit hard. I think it just isn't shifting down.


Thanks!

-- Joe

 

The converter will absorb most of the harshness of the shift.

 

I almost did the same thing as you... went with an auto with a stall. I went with the t-56 though and couldnt be happier. I just get a headache thinking about line pressures and torque converters and valve bodies and another cable to adjust... (i know that sounds whiney)

If you arent happy with the auto...swith to m6. Let your left foot determine you stall speed and your right arm determine when to downshift. Swapping to the 6-speed shouldnt be too bad for ya.

I look at it this way, you spent a year building the car. You built it the way you wanted it. No reason not to spend another few weeks changing it around.

Justin

 

The problem with the 6spd setup is it runs around $2000, and requires hard to find parts.

-- Joe

 

Huh... Im not a vette specialist. I figured you could do it for around 1500 for everything. C4 pedals shouldnt be hard to find. Not sure what your trans options would be....like I said I dont know much about the vettes. Just thought that there were enough C4s around you could get the conversion parts fairly easy...

Either way I hope you get her straightened out and the way you want!

Justin

 

With a cam that is 230 @.050 that converter should work good. It could use more but it's not necessary.

The stall will absorb a lot of the shift firmness when you are under it but full throttle should be tight. Adjust your TV and see what that changes.

Rob

 

Check the TV cable, reset the TV cable so that it is tight at WOT, it should now downshift.

 

I have not done that yet, but I put about 20 miles on the car today. If I shift manually, it's fast and can be.. if I leave it in drive, it can be lazy. sometimes it downshifts, sometimes it pops before it downshifts. So I think yeah, the TV tension. I'm guessing you probably want it to downshift BEFORE entering PE mode so it doesn't bog the engine, which is probably part of the problem.

Now.. The car does not 'feel' as fast as my supercharged stick shifted fbody. When you hit it, it's softer. But timing it from rolling to a certain mph its much faster. So it doesn't feel as fast, but actually is.. weird.. I'd say for pleasure, the 5spd setup had more 'initial kick', but this setup does appear to accelerate faster.

-- Joe

 

I agree it's probably the Tv adjustment. You'll want to set it properly before putting to many miles on the trans as it can hurt the trans not being at proper adjustment. AS you may well know, the TV cable is not a "downshift' cable. It controls the line perssure in the trans, thus varying the shift points buy changing the amount of pressure behind the governor. If trans pressure is low(improper cable adjustment) it can caused trans clutch slippage and excessive converter slippage.

 

I didn't know that, because I'm really stupid when it comes to automatics. I can read a diagram and install a shift kit, rebuild a tranny but I'm not too educated about autos. This is my first auto car. (that didn't come with a warranty, and was traded in 500 miles before the warranty expired).

I'll apply some more tension today.

Overall I'm happy with the car. not happy that my fan relay failed and the temp got up to 270 degrees yesterday, and boiled over a little, but...

-- Joe

 

I have a 3200 Vigilante behind my 406. It has a multi disc lock up converter in it. I lock the converter up at 5000 in second gear. I will tell you that it makes a significat difference. I cannot back that with hard data but I know this car well enough to know that it is seriously pulling harder.

Back many years ago when I started modifiying this car. I worked closely with Lingenfelter. John told me that on his automatics, he installed a manual lock up and would lock up the converter after the trans shifted into second.

With the MiniRam, it works best to lock it up higher in the rpm range.

www.geocities.com/dzperf

 

The factory procedure for adjusting the TV cable does not work.

When I press the button, the adjuster like flies outward towards the throttle body. If I depress it all the way in, and release the button, and pull the throttle arm so it's wide open, it does not auto adjust (click) the adjuster out. wtf.

As far as converter lockup, do you lock yours under cruise?

Rbob tells me that the tranny doesn't send all the fluid to the cooler unless the converter is locked.

-- Joe

 

After you push the cable all the way in hold it with your hand and take the tension off the button at the same time and let the adjuster ratchet out while you're holding it . It sounds kind of tricky but then you can feel what's going on . The other thing you might try is the Sonnax TV cable spring corrector ($7 from PATC).

 

Hi,
The best transmission for these cars is the 4L60e with an TCI controller. Get the stall right, I have an 2500 RPM stall. Make you own shift table, set up you own WOT shift points and enjoy.

 

[QUOTE=anesthes;3340034]The factory procedure for adjusting the TV cable does not work.

When I press the button, the adjuster like flies outward towards the throttle body. If I depress it all the way in, and release the button, and pull the throttle arm so it's wide open, it does not auto adjust (click) the adjuster out. wtf.

---------------------

I had some similar difficulty with my trans, which i rebuilt last month. Shifts weren't properly timed and made the car feel pretty sluggish. I suspected that my cheap aftermarket tv cable wasnt adjusted quite right, even when the cable was adjusted out as far as i dared pull it.
I had no access to a pressure gauge set at the time.

Removing the trans pan, and with a helper pressing the throttle to WOT i was able to see that the tv plunger wasnt being pressed all the way into the valve body. It needs to be totally depressed at WOT.

I adjusted the cable one click at a time until the adjustment was visibly correct at the valve body... made 100% difference. : )

 

"As far as converter lockup, do you lock yours under cruise? "

I have full manual control of mylock up. I do lock it up when cruising at steady speeds.

 

as for the fluid bypass vs lock up
The 700r4 vb internally bypasses approx 80% of the cooler flow when in 4th gear. Trying to spin the output shaft faster than the input(overdrive) creates excessive slippage in the converter. By bypassing the cooler internal trans pressure and volume are slightly elevated to aid converter lock up and to lessen converter slippage when un-locked. - This is fine for short term, but when running continously un-locked, the fluid temp will rise to the point of overheating.

- Excessive converter slippage is the reason that add-on OD units(such as gearvendors) only run as much as .76 ratio. Any steeper causes to much slippage, thus causing excessive heat, etc, etc.

The multi-clutch converters are designed with the ability/strength to be locked up under WOT without slippage. If you have the power to pull it locked-up, you transfer more power to the output shaft, thus more to the tires.

As for adjusting the TV cable, make sure it's fully extended at WOT. If it's still slugish at part throttle, get the Sonnax correction "kit". Cheap(like $7) and a very effective fix for non-factory application 700's.

 

you can borrow my sonnax spring to see if it helps, i won't be using it for a lil' while.