reverse doesn't work in 904

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68 A

68 A

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Hi,

so i finally got my rebuilt 318 running last night. This morning we pulled it outside to run it for half an hour and break the cam in. I had put about 3 quarts of ATF in the tranny.

The tranny is a remanufactured 904 with about 300 miles on it. I had Ammco install a TF-1 shift kit in it. When i went to back the car back into the garage, it didn't move very fast in reverse. I wasn't sure if it was just the 3200 stall converter, so i gave it some gas, went up to 4,000 for a second. Then i pulled it forward and put more ATF in, so that it was full on the dipstick. After that, i could not get it to go in reveres. forward works, but reverse did not.

I thoght maybe the shifting linkage was messed up, so i disconnected the linkage and put it into reverese on the transmission. when we started the car it jumped forward a little bit, and then would not move in either direction.

is it possible that i burnt something up when i tried to back up with 3 quarts of ATF?

any other ideas of what could be wrong?

Thank you,

Steve
 
You might very well have toasted something running it that low on fluid. Should have had at least 7 minimum. Here are the top 3 possibilities for problems.

1. The rear band is worn/burned and now isn't adjusted correctly.

2. The seal in the servo that actuates the rear band isn't sealing (blown).

3. There's a problem in the front clutch assy. i.e. seals blown or too much clutch clearance.

The #3 problem will also cause no 3rd gear. Have you driven it to see if it goes through all the gears? If so you can rule out that one. The other 3 can be easily checked by removing the pan and valve body.

1st thing to do is test drive it to see if it has all 3 forward gears. Don't just run it through the gears on jack stands either. That don't put a load on things. Drive it down the road. If 3rd gear works fine that's good news. Means the front clutch pack is good.

Next drop the pan and check the rear band adjustment. If it's way off that could be the problem. If not drop the valve body and pressure test the rear servo with about 30 lbs. of air to see if it's applying the rear band. If you need a pix of the test ports pm me and I'll e-mail it to you.
 
Hi,

i'd been wondeing if anyone was going to respond, and it sounds like you know how to help me out!!

i did take it down the road a little bit since it wouldn't go in reverese and needed to turn around. And all 3 forward gears did work, good news as you say. I dont know much about adjusting the rear band. I did look in the service manual and it tells remove the drain pan, and shows a picture of the adjuster, but didnt tell how to tell how much to tighten it. If you could give me more information on that it would help alot.

Hopefully this weekend i can get the rest of it together and get it down to my neighbors house (he has a car lift) and then get the pan off and check it out more.

Thanks alot,

Steve
 
Hi Steve. I hope I can help. Adjusting the band is easy especially if you have a lift to get the car up on. Just drop the pan and the adjuster shown in your manual has an outer locknut that should be backed off several turns so that you can torque down the inner screw to 72 inch lbs. Of course you'll need to get a inch lb. torque wrench to do this. The inner screw should then be backed off 4 turns and the locknut locked down carefully so as to not allow the inner screw to turn any.

BTW: Just to get a feel for where it was adjusted at I allways count the turns it takes to tighten it to see how close it was to the proper adjustment. If it is close chances are the adjustment isn't going to help and your problem is elsewhere. If it's loose it's quite possible that is your problem.

Also if you find alot of friction material (will look kinda like grey mud) in the bottom of the pan that's not a good sign.
 
is the throttle pressure linkage(kickdown linkage) hooked up? not the problem at hand with reverse, but another thing to look at. fishy will walk you thru the other stuff.
 
:stop: Just don't do what "I" did the first time I ever adjusted my bands...The adjuster threads look cruddy so I took it all the way out for cleaning......"wrong":angry7:, the book didn't say "not to take it out". Well, the band and blocks fell off and at the time I didn't know it. I was pretty sick off trans fluid after that weekend. LOL Fishy might remember me doing this.

As Fishy said...just tighten only, then back it off to spec. Don't take the adjusting pin out. Good luck.
 
the kickdown linkage is hooked up. I will double check that however.

thanks for the tip 69signet, i hate it when i do stuff like that. you could have just saved me lots of extra hours, frustration and time on here looking how to fix it.

Now i gotta get the front quarters on, a new exhaust gasket, and then i think i can get her to my neighbors house.

Thanks!

Steve
 
On other thing to remember when you put in a new trans, start and run the car in neutral this way the fluid will be circulating. The oil doesn't circulate thru the trans in park.

Chuck
 
Yes, check the fluid level in neutral, not park. The torque converter does not fill in the park position.

If you can drive it see if you have first gear braking when the shift lever is in manual low. If you do the rear band is working. If it just freewheels like it's in neutral whan you let off the gas in first gear then the band isn't applying or is way out of adjustment.

You don't need an inch pounds torque wrench to get close, snug up the adjuster lug, back off 4 turns and tighten the lock nut. This is close enough for testing. The major concern is not having the band too tight, not too loose.

If these all fail then the butchers at Ramco (did you know that over half the cars we service don't need a new transmission? But we try to sell you one anyway) have screwed up your valve body.

Good luck on that. You might as well just get another one and start fresh or buy a Turbo Action or other valve body.
 
i took it out and put her in manual low, and there was breaking, it did not free wheel. I have not adjusted anything yet, have not been very motivated today. I dont know much about valve bodies, stock or aftermarket, but since i have a high stall converter (3200) and a shift kit in it i might as well get an aftermarket valve body too?

Thanks,

Steve
 
ok, still haven't done anythign with the trans, but got looking at valve bodies on summit. Now i need some explanations of these. What is the difference with forward and reverse shift patterns, and what is the full manual, automatic/manual?

Thanks,

Steve
 
reverse and forward are the shift patterns. forward is PRN321, and reverse pattern is PRN123. manual means that when you come to a stop, shift back to first, and from takeoff you shift to 2nd and then to 3rd. usually manuals have the throttle pressure pegged out to max. if you like the driveability of popping it into drive, and going and letting the trans shift for you, then go with a full auto forward pattern.
 
Well, took it to the neighbors, put it on the lift, dropped the pan and...


smelled very burnt, along with metal in the pan and filter.

so now its sitting on the floor and will be going to a transmission shop tommorow morning.

hopefully that will solve me reverse problem,

and help me be more thoroug in the future.

Thanks for all the help!

Steve
 
Good luck Steve, hope it won't cost you much for repairs!...(that would suck) but again, it would be done :cheers:
 
Probably what was happening was the front clutch was not applying in reverse due to some screw up in the valve body, or the rear clutch wasn't releasing.

I wish you luck and hope you didn't take it back to Ramco.
 
If You Need A Valve Body,i Just Got One Of Turbo-actions New Pro-street Manual Valve Bodies....awesome.best Thing I've Done
In Years.i Don't Know Why I Hem-hawed About It For So Long.i'm
Glad That My "trans Coach"-,guitar Jones,helped Guide Me In This
Direction.....
 
i called ramco to see what they would quote it at, $695. I said thank you and hung up. My neighbor took it to the same guy that built his 7R400 (700R4?, anyway, its a bowtie). Said the guy is usually slow, but he's leaving for vacation when he gets all the tranny's done, he was gonna do a tear down today and let me know what he found tommorow. I'm hoping it won't need a complete rebuild, but i'll find out.

Thanks,
Steve
 
Steve sorry to hear about your misfortune but glad to hear you hung up on Ramco. If they did it right the first time it would still be working. That price of $695 is a little steep too for a stock rebuild and I bet that's what they were quoting. I just looked at John Copes catalog and he only charges $595 for a stock rebuilt trans. and I guarantee he does a much better job than Ramco.
 
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