I didn't have my buddy to help me finish the job tonight, so it took something like 4x the effort to do two simple tasks: (1) install the rear driveshaft and (2) bolt up the skid plate.
The driveshaft took forever because apparently I haven't done a good job greasing the slip joint. I could not get it to compress to fit, nor could I get it to expand to close the gap once I finally got it near where it needed to be. The skid always takes forever if it's a 1 man job, what with lining up the trans mount & then lifting the drivetrain, then the skid, no wait maybe drop the skid then raise the drivetrain again, aah, that's it. Aw crap, the trans mount studs aren't lined up anymore. And so on.
But I finally got it. Pushed it out of the garage (never got to Autozone to charge the battery) and got it close enough to my JKU to jump the TJ. Starting a vehicle for the first time after having the transmission out is a scary thing, but it fired up no problem. Ended up adding 2 more quarts of ATF to get it to start shifting gears. It's just shy of the full mark, but I know I'm gonna drain it again very soon so I decided to go with it. From a standstill, everything shifts fine. So let's road test it.
More details: the shift points are a little whack, but we didn't re-adjust the TV cable. I feel like it wants to go to 3rd a little early, and maybe it even goes into 2nd early. The shifts are very smooth now and it was hard to tell. I think the kickdown band probably needs a tweak as well; I'm not convinced I wasn't starting in 2nd at times, which I think would be the case if the kickdown band was too tight. Bottom line, I'm confident I solved the problem I set out to solve, which was no 2nd gear.
Next up: help my XJ friend swap his transmission that blew up on the trails over the weekend. Then I have all next week off work so I plan to re-drop my trans and fix the pump area leak.
But let's not bury the lead — I rebuilt a mother f'ing automatic transmission. I feel like I deserve a badge or something.
The driveshaft took forever because apparently I haven't done a good job greasing the slip joint. I could not get it to compress to fit, nor could I get it to expand to close the gap once I finally got it near where it needed to be. The skid always takes forever if it's a 1 man job, what with lining up the trans mount & then lifting the drivetrain, then the skid, no wait maybe drop the skid then raise the drivetrain again, aah, that's it. Aw crap, the trans mount studs aren't lined up anymore. And so on.
But I finally got it. Pushed it out of the garage (never got to Autozone to charge the battery) and got it close enough to my JKU to jump the TJ. Starting a vehicle for the first time after having the transmission out is a scary thing, but it fired up no problem. Ended up adding 2 more quarts of ATF to get it to start shifting gears. It's just shy of the full mark, but I know I'm gonna drain it again very soon so I decided to go with it. From a standstill, everything shifts fine. So let's road test it.
Spoiler alert: it drove pretty darn well.
More details: the shift points are a little whack, but we didn't re-adjust the TV cable. I feel like it wants to go to 3rd a little early, and maybe it even goes into 2nd early. The shifts are very smooth now and it was hard to tell. I think the kickdown band probably needs a tweak as well; I'm not convinced I wasn't starting in 2nd at times, which I think would be the case if the kickdown band was too tight. Bottom line, I'm confident I solved the problem I set out to solve, which was no 2nd gear.
Next up: help my XJ friend swap his transmission that blew up on the trails over the weekend. Then I have all next week off work so I plan to re-drop my trans and fix the pump area leak.
But let's not bury the lead — I rebuilt a mother f'ing automatic transmission. I feel like I deserve a badge or something.