Weird trans problem, any ideas?????
 

My sister has a '93 Olds 88 (L27/4t60e). When the car is cold and you start it up and put it in any gear it will not move at all. If you sit and let it warm up for ~5 minutes the car will move under its own power. The first couple times you come to a stop once it starts moving, you will have to downshift into first gear manually to make it go again. After you do that a couple times the trans will shift completely normal and not slip at all until it cools down again. The fluid is full. I don't know what could cause this unless the valvebody is screwed up.

Any ideas???

Shawn

Sounds like the fluid needs changing if the tranny works fine once the fluid is warmed up?
When was the last tranny fluid service done?
How cold are we talking here? Because up north in -40 it is common for it to slip untill warm but I'm thinkin it cant be that cold out where your sister is?

Sounds like a weak Pump, or a possible clogged filter... When was the last time the fluid and filter were change?

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I've done a tranny flush and a filter change to try to fix the problem, it didn't help. Thats why I came here. Sorry I didn't say that already.

When I say cold I don't mean like its cold outside. I'm talking about the trans not being warmed up to operating temps. The trans has to be well into the 100*F range before it will start working. Shit its like 45* where she is right now, thats plenty warm.

Shawn

Sounds to me like the problem might be pump/line pressure related. I had a similar problem with my '91 Olds 88, but mine would not shift out of 1st gear until the fluid got warmed up.

Basically, cold trans fluid is thicker and a "tired" pump will not be able to push it like it should.

When the trans shop opened up my tranny, they found a lot of other stuff going on, so they ended up doing a full rebuild.

The problem with the 4t60e is that you have to pull the whole trans apart to replace the pump I believe. God damn I don't really want to rebuild another one of those damn things this soon..... Anyone have any other ideas?

Shawn

In the fsm the only mention I found about cold tranny and the car not moving says to check the fluid level and wait for the car to reach operating temps before checking the level. Then it goes on about the condition of the fluid etc.
The rest desribes using a tech2 to scan the tranny and go through a diagnostic procedure for the tranny.

It could be pump related a scan tool will give you the line pressure.

Could be a semi plugged tranny cooler and once the fluid is up to temp it starts to flow better? Just throwing out some ideas here :?

Radiator is brand new so I can't see the tranny cooler being plugged but I guess its possible.

I'll put a Tech 2 on it and run the tranny diagnosis and see what I can find for line pressure.

Shawn

Isn't line pressure read in the 65-E? I didn't htink the 60-E's had a feature as such being that the Line pressure was controled by the Vacume modulator and not the PCM?

Am I wrong here?

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You might be right about that now that I think about it. I'll try it and see anyways, but I think you're probably right.

Shawn