Successful update: put the rest of the second gallon of atf in it, it, WE HAVE SHIFTAGE! I just didn't put enough fluid in it, it goes through all the gears just fine now, upshifts, downshift and engine brakes with no slippage.
I put some marvel mystery oil in the motor, ran it for a couple...
Unsuccessful Update: On friday I went out to the farm and spent the afternoon getting everything put back together. Had to look up a couple diagrams to figure out how the servo goes back in the bottom of the trans, and getting everything in place to put the valvebody back took some fiddling, but...
Shift kit showed up yesterday, just got the springs and clip installed into the valvebody on my lunchbreak at work. I'll head out to the farm on saturday, get everything put back together, and post an update.
Gear command is a compromise between the full manual valve body I want in it, and user friendliness for my aging parents who can use it as a farm truck once I get it on the road. It's entirely possible that I don't need it, it just seemed like the thing to do when I bought it :shrug:
The...
Once I had the valve body off and was scraping old gasket off the transmission, it actually started dripping water on me after a fair amount of ATF had dripped out. Just a couple tablespoons, but enough to know that your verdict is correct.
Couldn't say what kind of converter it has, but based...
I got the transgo kit with gear command! Been watching a lot of videos and reading forum posts for valve body modifications and the transgo kit comes with a little insert to lock the valve in place for gear command. Other people were talking about welding the valve to the valvebody but that...
Thanks! I did take the valves and springs out one by one to make sure they operate smoothly. It's quite clean in the valve body, part of the gasket just got stuck to the transmission valve passages. I scraped it clean with a razor being careful not to get gasket gookies up inside the...
It should be noted that I confirmed the shift linkage was not loose. Before dropping the valvebody I also confirmed that each gear on the ratchet shifter matched up with the shifter tang on the valvebody. Everything lined up perfectly there so not a linkage/shifter issue.
Negative, I tried reverse, drive, 2 and 1, got the RPM's up to about 3000 in each and it just acted like it was in neutral.
I was actually sitting in the truck on my phone with it idling for about 5 minutes and it suddenly went into reverse. No slippage, backed it over to the front yard but it...
I've got an '83 GMC S15 with a 350/TH350 swapped into it. It's had delayed engagement since I've bought it and it finally got so bad it doesn't want to go into any gear at all anymore. I suspected a valve-body issue since once it would go into gear it would upshift, downshift, and enginebrake...
1 year update: It's totally fine.
I changed the oil after this whole fiasco, cut the filter open and it was immaculate with zero metal or nylon shavings. The truck's been running flawlessly and I make SURE to check the oil level at least once a week.
I installed a mechanical oil pressure guage...
Final update:
New plugs installed, she's running just like new again.
Bought a vacuum guage and fiddled with the idle mixture, also need to get my hands on a different vacuum pot since she's only pulling about 13-15 at idle. (Lumpy cam).
Thanks for all the responses and the reassurances. I'm...
quick update: took my laser thermometer out and fired her up. Pointed it at the headers as she was idling, #8 was the only one that wasn't heating up. Pulled the plug out and took the below picture. Gonna pull the rest of the plugs and check for additional fouling. I'll put new plugs in and see...
Update: Added 2 quarts, oil level is happy and the pressure gauge is back to pegged, but she's now got a dead miss on at least 2 holes. Gonna borrow a compression tester and figure out which ones. Gonna also check under the valve covers while cranking for possible wiped cam lobes.