Restoring Rusty

[Gregski]

and out of all the 57 bolts on top of this monstrocity these are the only two that actually hold it down to the transmission no kidding no joke

[LT7A]

Originally Posted by Gregski

too far forward and kiss the dash and then lay way too far back and hug the seat

It just sounds like it's lonely.

[LT7A]

Originally Posted by Gregski

now before you blame me the installer let me tell you that the other bolt (the one on the side) that worked itself out is only held in place by like 3 threads and then it is designed to bottom out and can't screw in any further, so there's that

It appears that some loctite love is in your immediate future. I'm far too much of a realist to be a silver linings guy, but it does appear that there's an alternate perspective available here. If you had never pulled the transmission cover off and allowed the shifter to move around enough to telegraph the problem, one day you might have had the lever pop off in your hand and be waving it around the cab wondering what to do with it. Be okay if it was stuck in drive but if it was in reverse it might be a different story.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by LT7A

It appears that some loctite love is in your immediate future. I'm far too much of a realist to be a silver linings guy, but it does appear that there's an alternate perspective available here. If you had never pulled the transmission cover off and allowed the shifter to move around enough to telegraph the problem, one day you might have had the lever pop off in your hand and be waving it around the cab wondering what to do with it. Be okay if it was stuck in drive but if it was in reverse it might be a different story.

Yeah the last three breakdowns were in my driveway, thank you Rusty!

[LT7A]

Originally Posted by Gregski

Yeah the last three breakdowns were in my driveway, thank you Rusty!

Funny, my last two have been as well. I managed to find a little gratefulness for that in the middle of my frustration of the breakdown. Are you going to contact Lokar? They should want to be aware of this issue, after all, it was more than one screw that was jettisoned. It seems that they might need to provide loctite with the shifter. Plus, they oughta overnight you a couple of the right size screws.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by LT7A

Funny, my last two have been as well. I managed to find a little gratefulness for that in the middle of my frustration of the breakdown. Are you going to contact Lokar? They should want to be aware of this issue, after all, it was more than one screw that was jettisoned. It seems that they might to provide loctite with the shifter. Plus, they oughta overnight you a couple of the right size screws.

Yes I wrote them an email and sent it in with pics. Eric called me back and we spoke on the phone. They mainatain that an S bend in the threaded rod is still the way to go, well now Eric said put two S bends in the shifter rod to get around the Neutral switch on the side of my 4L60e.

I asked him if you could send me the rod with the bends in it and I would gladly pay them for it if not at least the shipping, he said they can not because it depends on my application, which I disagree with, since they know exactly which position my stick sits in and how far it needs to go to the stock transmission lever, plus they should have a mule trans set up in their lab or their test station.

He also told me I can not use their cable shifter since it appears my trans crossmember is in the way.

I am honestly looking at other options, and cable I think is the only way to go.

[Gregski]

if you're tired of doing things right the first time, and prefer to do things the hard way than I strongly recommend looming your thinned out custom LS wiring harness whilst already installed on the truck

here I have pulled up the transmission branch which I put off looming for about a year

I figured now's as good time as any since I had to remove the turtle shell to fandangle with the busted Lokar shifter

[Gregski]

and this is where things went south

the unloomed wiring harness worked

the purdy loomed harness not so much, well it worked except for one thing, it wouldn't show me which gear I selected manually with the Lokar shifter like it useta could

so I quickly determined it must be the gooey neutral safety switch, cause the earlier two plug ones had the plugs silliconed or glued in and usually they would break if you tried to divorce them

here I was trying to take the plug off of one of the wire connectors in order to clean it, but not even with my specialized tool could I remove the pins, no way no how

[Gregski]

I had no choice but to fork over $30 bucks to AMAZON for new plugulators

hind sight, I should have done did this when I first did the enjin swap!

[Gregski]

naturally we will be replacing the Multi Language Profanity generator aka MLP Switch as well as it is covered in Gorilla snot having seen better days

thank you General for building in this obsolescence

[Gregski]

so the new neutral safety switch for the 4L60e and the pig tails showed up

[Gregski]

and it looks like they plugulate nicely

[LT7A]

So help me understand. You decided to fix some stuff while you were in there that wasn't really broken but could be better. And in order to fix it you had to break it and now that it's broken you have to unbroke it. Is that about right?

If so, I can sympathize and wish you luck.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by LT7A

So help me understand. You decided to fix some stuff while you were in there that wasn't really broken but could be better. And in order to fix it you had to break it and now that it's broken you have to unbroke it. Is that about right?

If so I can sympathize and wish you luck.

that is positively correct

[Gregski]

when splicing in a new pig tail I like to cut my wires in staggered formation to offset the joins and keep my wiring harness from looking like an anaconda that just swallowed a bunny rabbit whole

[Gregski]

and just like that we got our gear selector reading proper gears again, upper right hand corner of my super awesome (pronounced: expensive) gauge

[Gregski]

Well great, no sooner do I fix that, and now I have to deal with a clicking solenoid I recon, more as the news develops

[Wgesnerjr]

I learned this as well.

For those that try to unplug the shift indicator switch on the trans, the plugs are "glued" in for some reason. I figure some one at GM thought they should keep contaminates out.

I learned that if you heat the switch with a heat gun or blow drier, the plugs will release. This will have to be done each time you unplug as the glue will adhere once the plugs are inserted.

Gregski found the easiest way of all. Replace with a non-glued switch and plugs.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Wgesnerjr

I learned this as well.

For those that try to unplug the shift indicator switch on the trans, the plugs are "glued" in for some reason. I figure some one at GM thought they should keep contaminates out.

I learned that if you heat the switch with a heat gun or blow drier, the plugs will release. This will have to be done each time you unplug as the glue will adhere once the plugs are inserted.

Gregski found the easiest way of all. Replace with a non-glued switch and plugs.

Yes sir, I wish I would have done did this prior to droppin her in the rig. Anywho the previous motor owner must have gently removed the plugs using a 5 foot long pry bar, just sayin'

Interestingly my 2004 swap has the newer style larger single plugulator on this switch, and GM must have ran out of glue for those, cause it seems to go in and out freely

[Gregski]

so I managed to hook up my laptop with HP Tuners on it and use a feature in the Scanner called Controls & Special Functions which allows you to click things off and on on demand in hopes of figuring out which one of the transmission solenoids is doing all the loud clicking

and I must admit with the key in the on position and the truck not running, both 1-2 and the 2-3 solenoids sound exactly the same

I also drove around with each one disabled at a time to see if the clicking goes away, and it does with both, but I think the 1-2 solenoid is the bad one, as I don't think we'll ever shift from second to third if the 1-2 solenoid is disabled type a thing

if you got experience with this stuff please help a brother out, I aint an automagical transmission expert by any means

[LT7A]

Cool that you have that diagnostic capability and I hope it indicates the problem. Sorry that I am no help.

[Gregski]

yeah I'm pretty sure we need to replace the transonamission solenoid, so I decided to check my camber instead

we always air them up to some consistent pressure at all four corners, I went 35 PSI today

[Gregski]

then I decided that the good ol' analog Cambermatic 300 just was not cutting it any longer

shown here reporting an absurd amount of negative camber on the texter side of the rig, don't get me wrong it's accurate but it reads in "bubbles" and not in degrees

[Gregski]

so it was time to whittle a new tool (not my idea I seen this on the InterWebs)

[Gregski]

you know me and rounded corners on my brackets, well that's how I do on custom tools as well...