transmission issue

[Drewet88]

hey guys been a long time since i posted but mainly because of my job, no time for fun at all. Now I got a new job better pay and better hours very hard to come by with the way the economy is looking around me. Here is my problem

About 50% of the time I drive my car it will feel like the transmission is slipping if it doesn't do it at 20-25mph it will do it at 40-45mph the other half of the time it drives normally. Could this be the start of my transmission dying?

The second part just started today when I'm accelerating from a stop there's a little grinding noise from underneath my car and I can feel it in the gas pedal. Could these problems be connected?

The car is a 1987 Oldsmobile Regency Brougham I dont have the mileage of the car on me but I can say its over 100k under 175k exact mileage tomorrow.

O yes I dropped the pan to the transmission about 5 months ago and drained the fluid and changed the filter it rode fine after that up until the cold weather hit.

[CL8]

Just 3 months ago the transmission on my Dodge Caravan went out (while visiting my folks), over $2000.00 to have it repaired at Aamco.

It was slipping as you are describing for about a year before it went out.
I had it checked out once for slipping but Aamco said it was fine then (about a year before it died) My guess is, it was dying then.

Don't know about the grinding though.

[Drewet88]

Lol thanks I had a feeling it was the transmission dying as for the grinding I assumed it was the transmission getting worse. I was going to pull a transmission from the junk yard but I didn't know if I could do it without pulling out the entire engine. Does anyone know of a way?

[maxwedge]

You can pull the trans seperately just need a way to support the engine while doing it, the usual way is a cross strut tower brace. Typically those trans missions where not good from day one so a used one is a big risk.

[Drewet88]

Yea I was thinking that I was going to just get a new one I found a few websites all of the transmissions shops around me are talking thousands to get it rebuilt or for a new one.

I know its a risk to get a used one from the junkyard but at the moment I think that may be only answer unless I want to be without this car for a little while. The one good thing about the junkyard that I go to is I get to try as many transmissions as I need and I get 30 days to just keep trying.

If I had a garage I would try a rebuild kit on this one myself and if I messed up just get one from the junkyard but I stay in an apartment now and working on cars is strictly prohibited. I already got a $45 ticket for changing my oil after the office was closed for the day. One of my neighbors snitched on me but I guess I had it coming.

Is taking out the transmissioin as simple as unhooking it from the cooler lines and then unhooking it from the motor. I know there is more to it and if I was actually under the car I could see everything thats its connected too.

[Jrs3800]

To get the Trans out of the H body you have will be a lot like the way I had to deal with the van... But you will have to have a support fixture to hold the engine up..

The Drivers side section of the sub frame will detach... And from that point you can drop the trans out..Its a PITA but it can be done..

Your H body will be a tad different looking but its comes apart in the same manner..




Its a lot of work to replace the trans.. And soon I'll be doing an engine swap to the newer 3800...lol

The trans you have was not a good GM unit by any means... There were a lot of issues with the early 440-T4 units... The later 90-93 were better... But a lot of those used the 5 pin connector instead of the 4 pin connector.. One of the other issues with these were that GM plumed the cooler for the trans on the hot side of the radiator, so the trans ran too hot more than most of the time... You will be hard pressed to find an 87-88 unit in good shape from behind a 3.8..

If at all possible and you are very mechanically inclined you may attempt the rebuild on your own, but be ware that you should have certain tools to do the rebuild.. I have done a couple and am here to tell you when I do the next one I will invest in a few tools to help in the rebuild.. When I did my rebuild the parts and pieces alone ran me $500-$600 when it was all said and done, and that was due to some of the hard parts I had to replace.. Good Luck and let us know what you decide to do..

[Drewet88]

Well you say it will be hard to find one in good shape and its not like a transmission is something i can look at and know if it is in good shape. I doubt I'm mechanically inclined enough to do a rebuild on my own and none of my mechanic friends have ever done one.

It seems as if trying transmission swaps are my only option. I have found a few websites where they are selling rebuilt transmissions for about $1000 but no warranty and other sites where there are warranty's but they run about $1000 more.

Does anyone know of all the different cars I can get this transmission out of? Worst case scenario I'll just park it until I can afford to get a rebuilt transmission or find a transmission shop with a decent price.

[Drewet88]

Just found a rebuilt transmission online for about $700 with a 3year warranty and no core charge. But has anyone ever heard of everdrive.com?

[Drewet88]

Okay this may seem weird but I got my transmission looked at by a shop near me to have them test drive and look around and I was told that all of my mounts are shot. Which is weird because I just replaced the motor mounts when I did my engine swap but regardless ever the tranny mounts are out.

They said all of the slipping can be from that due to somethings not meeting like they're suppose to and lack of pressure. They suggested that I try changing those before I just bring them a transmission to put in and also to change my fluid and filter at the same time. They didn't even try to sell me on a transmission flush. They said to use a bottle of lucas and some good fluid after changing the mounts and if that didn't fix the problem they would look deeper for me.

Sounds like good advice or were they just giving me the run around because they wanted to go home I tried googleing and such but I didn't find any posts that said bad mounts could cause slippage. O and that may or may not fix the grinding of course it wouldn't do it when they were in the car with me.

[maxwedge]

There is no way motor mounts cause trans to slip.

[Drewet88]

thats exactly what I was thinking I think they wanted to change my mounts, charge me for that and then go o it didn't work we need to go inside and see whats wrong it'll be another $300. That's my guess.

[Drewet88]

man everytime I use my gsm connection through at&t I can't edit or even post correctly I have to go through advance setting to post so please ignore all the back to back postings where I could've easily edited the last posting.

So I was thinking I'm just going to go ahead and order that rebuilt one with the 3 yr warranty and install a transmission cooler. Some people may consider it a lot of money to spend on an old car but I love this car and plan on having it until its impossible for me to keep it.

I'm also changing the mounts I have them now but would it be better for me to wait until I'm doing the swap to switch them out or do it now?

I'm guess the latter but its nice to get an opinion from you guys and gals.

[Drewet88]

Ok I took your advice maxwedge and went ahead and ordered a reman transmission. There's no point in that trial and error method that I was thinking of doing it is way better to do it right the first time and not have to pull it back out go to the junk yard pull another one put it in and pray.

Now I just have to get a transmission cooler before it comes so I can do it all at once.

Any suggestions on which transmission fluid to use I don't want to do this again for a long long time.

O yea the the transmission has a 3yr unlimited mileage warranty.

[maxwedge]

The usual Dexron 3 or 6.

[Drewet88]

I shouldn't add anything to it to preserve anything? Maybe I'm just being paranoid. Clean fluid and a new filter should be enough.