This has been a real ordeal. But first to the foamy trans fluid.
When I replaced the TCC case connector on Ray's car, I had to remove the side cover to get some of the broken retainers out. There was very little fluid that came out. Mostly what was sitting on the bottom lip of the cover and a little puddled in the bottom of the valve body housing. Today when we took off the cover on this car, there was lots of fluid came out. I believe the foamy problem might have been that the transmission was over full.
Now, for the ordeal part. I ordered the switch and gasket from Transtar on Goshen Springs Road in Norcross. A major supplier of transmission parts. I went down on the day it was to arrive, and they had sent it to a location near Auburn, Alabama. So, we reordered and it was to be in on Thursday.
Thursday, I made another trip to Transtar only to be told that he forgot to order it. So, it was ordered again and because of the labor day weekend, would not arrive until Tuesday. This time I called before making the trip. Warehouse sales counter goes to voice mail. Left a message. Called two more times during the day, leaving a message. No return call.
So I called an ACDelco dealer in Winder. The switch and gasket are no longer uavailable, says they. Called Sosebee's ACDelco Auto Parts in Lawrenceville. They said it would be in this morning by 10:30, but they didn't have the gasket. Called Nash Chevrolet in Lawrenceville. They could get the gasket by next week but Maxey Price in Loganville had 4.
This morning, I hotfooted it down to Loganville and picked up the gasket, then back up to Lawrenceville to Sosebee's. Arrived at 10:35. No part was showing for me. He asked me again what name it was under and when I told him, a guy that had just brought in a push cart full of parts and was entering them into the computer says "Here it is" scanned it in and handed it over to the sales clerk. I'm a happy camper, now.
A warning---This isn't a one person job. There are times you need to be above and underneath at the same time.
TCC Case Connector--Transtar invoice part number is 74444A with another number of 25A-103. It's called a Connector, Part Nr.700-R4 Case G. There's a photo of it in Tech Advise in my article on replacing the switch or connector. Gotta do some rewriting of that, after what we learned on this job.
TCC lockup switch--ACDelco part number 8689901 cross references to Transtar 64425B.
GM Valve body cover gasket--8643573 cross references to Transtar 64301F. F is for the thicker fiber gasket, not the cork one.
I noticed that the Transtar gasket was thicker than the GM gasket. That might be beneficial.
Due to the weather, we got a late start. John (GTXvette) came over and got to work on it. Not a great deal of problem getting everything apart. Not a lot of problem getting the new switch mounted back into the transmission. The thing that took the longest was getting the switch plugged back into the TCC Case Connector. That's the plastic piece that the outside harness plugs into and the switch plugs into inside the transmission. Just no working room.
We finally decided to detach the TVI cable where it's bolted to the transmission. This was done per directions in a how-to article on Pennocks by Chuck Kichline. Don't remember his username at the moment. Unbolting the TVI cable and pulling on it moves a bracket out of the way to make it easy to plug the switch into the back of the connector.
Our experience after more than an hour of trying is that if you plug it in, you're lucky. After a lot of trying and failing, I thought John was going to go home for the day. We decided that we would take the TCC Case Connector out, pass the switch wires through the case so we could plug it in with the connector and harness end outside the case. With a little work, we had to plug the TCC harness back into the outside of the case connector to have something to grip while I pulled on it, John worked his magic on the retainer tabs inside the case. It popped right out.
We found that working in the blind we had bent the terminals of the case connector where the switch plugs on. Straightened them, plugged the switch in, inserted the case connector back into the case, and in probably an hour's time, it was buttoned back up.
I suggest that if you ever have to replace your TCC switch, that you plan it well in advance. Get the OEM switch so you don't have to cut and splice wires. It will be hard to do in that confined space, and you risk them shorting or coming loose later. The aftermarket switches also have two mounting points. The OEM only has one and its held on by a #30 Torx head bolt. Get the gasket and get the TCC Case Connector. That way you can break the case connector to get it out if you need, then install the new one. All these are available at Transtar. But like I said, plan the job in advance. Their prices are cheaper than anywhere else.
John, I thank you very much for taking on this job. I'm sorry for the difficulties, but it turned out to be a good learning experience. You're a real champ.
