Well, I tinkered with it for awhile, the vacuum modulator is buried in the maze of cross members and has a metal line from the intake manifold to the trans. On the same vacuum tee on the manifold is a mickey mouse setup for the cruise control, a skinny plastic sleeve that goes into another plastic union to a vacuum hose with one end having a larger diameter hole than the other(this is the second Nissan that I've found a hose like this, hence why I won't ever buy another Nissan again!)
I finally took it to a tranny shop that rebuilt my Camaro auto many years ago and they reported that the torque convertor is shot, hence missed shifts, etc. and also the case is worn out. They are going to have a machine shop try to sleeve it, or it's time for a new case. The trans shop also stated that Japanese cars have the weakest transmissions of all vehicles and that they rebuild a lot of Japanese trannys.