Today was an expensive day , on the way to the college ...

Just driveing along about 60 mph on the highway , came across a slow truck , so i passed him , went to 3/4 throttle and got around ....I let off the gas to coast back down and once down to 60 i went to give it gas and the engine reved but the car wouldnt speed up .....so i pulled off ......Restarted the car hopeing for a stuck solendoid and i managed to get drive again so i got back out on the highway and realized i only had first , it would try to shift out of first but once there it had nothing .....

Limped into a parkinglot and beagan to check for codes , NO CODES!!!!!!! Fluid is full but it looks black (just changed that stuff and filter 2 months ago)...Doesnt smell burt so maybe it was my sungalsses and the sun outside that made it look thataway ....Had it towed home for more checking , found a noise coming from inside the tranny , sounds like maybe one of the planearys is gone or a band came apart ...whatever it is it doesnt sound good....Limped it to the tranny shop about a mile away and thats where it sits right now getting as the mechanic says "an autopsie"....Gonna play it by ear , if the cost is to much ill limp it back home and attempt to pull it out myself with the severly limited equipment i got here ......

Avereageing about 1000 bucks a month to keep this heep on the road, eagerly awaiting next month when the engine explodes ....too bad my credit cards are maxed out now from the last failure ...Sucks , i just got the damned tranny to quit leaking too , went 4k with no leaks anywhere on the car...

Im REALLY starting to hate this car .....

Bummer dude. Big time.

Well, on a slightly positive note... Time to get a 4T65E in there or a Cad Touring Sedan gearing (3.33's isn't it?).

Check and see if the 4T65E and 4T60E trans have the same connectors and such, if so, see what a boneyard gets for a 4T65E, they are likely more common nowdays than the "old" 4T60E from a Cad.

Tom

Bummer dude. Big time.

Well, on a slightly positive note... Time to get a 4T65E in there or a Cad Touring Sedan gearing (3.33's isn't it?).

Check and see if the 4T65E and 4T60E trans have the same connectors and such, if so, see what a boneyard gets for a 4T65E, they are likely more common nowdays than the "old" 4T60E from a Cad.

Tom


say they do have the smae connections, will it be campatible with the original caddy ecm?

you see, i have considered using one for my 91' seville, just not too sure about the ecm and such.

BTW, stoney, sorry to hear about your luck with the cad. dont give up on her just yet, that 4.9 liter is good for many more miles.

Spose the engine will be up to more ?

hey you got experence with these , ever do the tranny ?

I did 4l80e's in the military i guess it couldnt be any worse to rebuild , its just the takeing in and out that worries me ...ALOT ....hearing horror storys of subframes haveing to be removed with engines and trannys , but looking at all data it says the tranny can come out alone , and i didnt see any subframe clearance issues when i looked it over before the tow truck came and got it ...

How high up do i need to get the car ? i got regaulr jackstands and a decent floor jack ....

when i did mine for my 87' a while back, i pulled the whole engine from the top and swapped from there. i would have done it from underneith, but i did not have the tools availiable to me at the time.

ahh , im trying to find kits to rebuild it now , seems like someone said there was a place that sold one with beatter parts in it than the normal kits

A Picture is worth a thousand words. This is how high you have to lift up the car. Also note the homemade engine support. It's just a piece of 2x6 with a couple of pieces of threaded rod that hooks into the engine hooks. Very simple.

I recommend that you buy a rebuild video. It makes it sooo much easier.
Here are couple links.
http://store.kdsperformance.com/tranrebvidan.html
http://www.technicalvideos.com/videos/transmission.phtml

Best place (and cheapest) to buy parts is:
http://www.bulkpart.com/

I would also recommend installing a transgo shift correction package especially if you drive hard.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v48/rhedahl/IM000733.jpg

Thanks for the info dude

we shall see what the next 2 days brings , i went ahead and had the guy remove it from the car ($345)....He said by thrusday he will have an awnser for me , its a 3 man shop with 3 cars infront of me and a total of 7 cars ...

We agreed to have it removed and see whats up , also agreed that if things are too bad to get the car at least able to roll to be towed here to the house ...

Pretty sure ill go ahead and let them do it , i dont have enough confidence to do it myself because of the lack of tools , my garage is a far cry from the military shop i worked at ....I leanred to do 4l80e trannys with all the special tools lifts and everything in a big shop , im a little too worried i dont have everything i need...

Wow, thats the one thing that I dread happening to my car.....

now right now I dont have links but within about 30 min of searching on the weekend I came up with these things:

Alto Red Eagle High Performance Clutch 4t60e model #062758AHP
Transgo Shift kit Jr.....some new parts to correct some problems
Milzy Shift Kit.....cant seem to find much info on this


Not much on complete rebuild kits that I could find but if you do rebuild it definently go and get the shift kit JR....that would be the right time to put that stuff in...and the cheapest Ive found it is 40 bucks.

Ive been dreading it on my car for awhile now , esp after i learned how weak these trannys are .....Ever since i realized what could happen i took it very easy on that tranny , indeed it has the B&m shift improver but it was a attempt to get rid of the TCC code , which worked without hurting its already piss poor shifting quality . Ever since i bought it i thought that it shifted WAY to rough for a cadillac , but thought a new motormount would cure it since i bought it with a busted one . but one motormount and 30k later the bastard shifted rough to the very bitter end ...

Got my theroys on how it died tho :
1)Fluid change 5k ago (125k but no flush)
2)Idle motor crapped the bed and money was tight so i let it go for a month , pretty much powerbrakeing it at every light till i could kick the idle down by tapping the pedal
3)Something was dead wrong from day 1 (remeber i found all the side cover bolts were loose and a non oem gasket used there)
4) Or its just the very typical GM crap transmissions they toss in cars .... only chrysler made worse transmissions for there "LH" cars , but gm slaps these balls of turds in every car and truck they made after the early 70s.....

I love the car but if i had to do it all over again i woulda left that damn thing at the car lot i bought it from and gotten another G20 , Always had great luck with used Nissan products ....But ive spent almost a grand this month before the tranny decided to do its nasty deed , to much money in it now to think about getting rid of it ...It now a love hate realtionship ....

IF (big if) i ever buy another caddy , it will be brand new .....No more used american cars .....

Hey hey,

I saw that you only took the driver side axle off, right? I thought you had to take both off... I guess when putting the new one in I'll need an extra hand to align that axle to go in... I saw nothing about taking off the starter to get to the flywheel bolts, is it possible to just remove the cover down there to get to them?

Well making the engine support fixture tomorrow, if the weather is good.

Did you put anything special on the cork gaskets at all? Or just put them in dry? I guess its still necessary to lube the side cover/pan bolts as well to get the correct torque...right?

Thanks for your insight,
Brian W.

In the proces of pulling my trans right now. Have a low Km tranny ready to pop in. The original had about 360,000 km (factory trans) and I regularly pull an 18 ft boat around with the car. The original trans still goes, but has an internal valving problem and won't route fluid through the cooler ; Oh well, it clunked anyways. Heres what I've built for an engine support. Total cost was about $30 cdn, paint was leftovers. If there is anybody in my area, you are welcome to borrow the engine support (between Sudbury and North Bay ONt.) Stoneage, you're at the point I was at last year - It sucks! but eventually you'll have replaced enough that the car will ride and drive like new again and you'll be happy - I am, and I was at the point where the next repair job was going to entail a pier and 30 ft of water.

Chris

Hey hey,

I saw that you only took the driver side axle off, right? I thought you had to take both off... I guess when putting the new one in I'll need an extra hand to align that axle to go in... I saw nothing about taking off the starter to get to the flywheel bolts, is it possible to just remove the cover down there to get to them?

Well making the engine support fixture tomorrow, if the weather is good.

Did you put anything special on the cork gaskets at all? Or just put them in dry? I guess its still necessary to lube the side cover/pan bolts as well to get the correct torque...right?

Thanks for your insight,
Brian W.

Both axles were removed however I had put the wheel back on the passenger side (just for looks).

On mine I did not have to remove the starter. There was barely enough room to get around it to install the torque converter bolts. However, the starter on the Cadillac Allante is about 1/2 the size of the rest of the Cadillacs because they are Japanese gear driven starters.

I didn't put any on the cork gaskets. However, I took all the covers and bumped each hole out (where each bolt goes through the covers).

If you buy the car as a mechanics special at a Toyota dealership... there is going to be problems and unknown history... not really Cadillac's fault...

... I thought GM always had good trannys in their cars? if you get the trasn rebuilt... you shoudl be set.. with these cars it is usually just the suspension... the 4.9 is a solid engine though

a good point .....but that last 3 GM trucks weve had have all had there trannys replaced at least once under warranty , of them went thru 2 trannys , one went thru 3 of them ....I spent 4 years in the military having to rebuild 4l80e and 4l60e trannys , GM trannys are junk ....Even the new MAXX we have has been in the shop 9 times already and is awaiting another appointment , but its not the tranny at least , this one is the engine and steering ....

Only reason we buy them is becuse of the discounts we get thru my uncle(gm employee), bought the caddy only expecting to keep it 6 months , then money got tight on me ......

True bummer ....

I am in same boat, had car one month, spent 1K in repairs.
And no end in site....
But car is on road again...and crossing my fingers and hoping.
Sure love the ride and the looks it gets..

Seems you gave me advice a few short weeks ago....
Heed your own advice....and then drive it like you stole it!
Sorry to hear the bad news...

I am spoiled now....but new caddys have the same problems, what I have read on several boards now is : They want to sell there new ones and stick with the mid 90's....according to car and driver...there was only one caddy that was a flagship and worth owning....Yup 96 STS....
but stick with this rule of thumb 93/96/99/02/05 and you should be okay.

Again sorry to hear the bad news, hope you are back cruising again soon.

Hey at least you don't owe your old man 4 grand for a transmission and transfer case.

Wow, you can't get a break on anything....... I'd be interested in the autopsy, and aside from the mechanic's special, do you have any idea what the history is on it? Look on the bright side, it made it this far, you could have had a Ford AXOD, or one of the Chrysler trannies. :disappoin

RB , actually i now owe the old man $2600 for a GM Goodwrench Tranny , on top of the 1400 left owed on the car , funny i owe more on the tranny than the whole car .......Still have the 782 fromt he A/C job on my credit card....

As for the autopsie the mecanic was very surpised i knew exactly what failed , it was the container for the clutch packs (found 2 failures of this on this board). Unforeutnatly it did this dureing a pass from 35 mph to 65 mph , tranny guy said it went under MASSIVE torque takeing the case with it , nothing ever made it outside the case and it held its fluid the whole time but the entire inside of the case is junk. Forgot to ask him to keep the stuff on hand so i can take pictures of it ...

I just feel like $%^& becuse i know i can do it if i had the tools and stands tall enough to get it out , of which 4 are holding dads 73 corvette up while we store it.

As for the replacemnt it is a complete rebuilt unit from GM with torque converter (BBOB who does these?). 5 year 50k warranty , parts and labor ....$2200 ,300 for a new cooler (doesnt sound right to me) and a freebie tranny gear selector switch (the thing on the top of the tranny the selector cable goes to) my labor for the whole job is a steal at 345 bucks

Illlumina , im takeing the B&M shift improver off the keep from voiding the warranty and the fact i wont need it to keep the TCC code from poping up ...PM me if you want it .....Just remeber when(if) you use it that these clutch pack containers are weak (wonder if a 4t80e container would fit in there)

Just shows how much my dad (and i guess me) loves this car , when he told me how much it was gonna be i told him , lets just junk it , thats too much to spend on an old car....We talked it over on what had to be the longest cellphone call ever known going over our options (one of which was a 93 taurus with 128k). Decided a used take out was too much risk without a rebuild being it could only come from a 95 and older . I was really jst gonna junk it and go get a 4cyl toyota pickup (i know i wouldnt have problems with those)

Reminds me of the day he and i found this damned car , we couldnt stop giggleing about it and bought it on the spot since it was so cheap and in such great shape outside the suspension and engine electrical work ....

I got spoiled by the 30,000 trouble free miles since then ....