Well Joe,

The problem, which I told you before I returned it to you, was the transmission as unfixable, or as I said in this e-mail

“Well, the problem with the transmission is linear flex caused by the case
> being cut with a sawzall. The shape of the bell is a part of the
structure
> of the case, the combination of you cutting it open and weakening it,
> adding horsepower and using an undersized converter is that the case is no
> longer aligned, the transmission as it is now is unbuildable, the case
needs
> to be replaced.
>
> G”

But before I get into it, since you chose to bring it up here and not wait to give me the chance to respond to the e-mail, let’s go over the whole thing.

The first one, when it failed, I didn’t have one here and didn’t want to make you wait all day while I fixed it, so I went to my local Ford dealer and bought a brand new one, brought it here and built it for you. Not a problem, a core is a core. Except when you got here, when I unload yours, it has the bottom of the bell housing removed with a sawzall, which means the core you returned cost me $600. Oh, and the pump gear was shattered (more on this one later) which I thought was more or less strange, but it happens, can’t be helped, cost of doing business, etcc… I thought at the time, the sprag failed, died a spectacular death and locked up the heavy clutch, which seized the input shaft and broke the pump gear…so much for the root cause diagnosis, (which I didn’t realize at the time was wrong). I ditched the case (well, not really, I made a display model out of it and have it to this day, more on that later too…)

So you take the brand new transmission, never installed in a car and dyno tested (worked perfect, every field in the first normal standard deviation of the range, about as perfect as can be) back with you. I’m out a case, a pump and some misc parts, but like I said, part of the cost of doing business, I’ll live; at least you’re good now.

But then a year later, you call again. No go condition, tranny is dead. At least this time I know not to pre-build one and be out another case. We exchange a few e-mails, finally get a day scheduled for you to bring it down.
Now I don’t know if you were aware of it or not, it’s no small thing to me, but the “day job” has a contractual right to force me to work 2 out of every 3 Saturdays, and for the most part they do (funny thing, they always seem to have a broke transmission or 20 somewhere that needs fixed). The end result is, taking a Saturday off costs me two things, first, I will be forced to work the next two, whether I want to or not, and second, I loose quite a few dollars by taking one off ($30 an hour, 12 hours, time and a half, figure it out). But no big deal, I’ll take a day to make sure I get you taken care of. Except the first 2 days we scheduled, you didn’t show up, so I stay around the house, afraid to leave because I was worried you had car problems, whatever and were still coming. Not even the courtesy of a call to say “maybe next week”, you just don’t show up. Two days wasted, and a few grand more or less in lost pay. Finally we arrange for you to ship it down. It shows up, collect. After I drove 50 miles to pick it up, I leave it there because I’m not going to pay the shipping. A day later we get that worked out and I drive 50 miles again to get it. When it gets here, sure enough the bell housing is cut open again, but this time it’s very hard to get apart. I suspect the case is ruined, but to make sure I have to “probe map” it. That’s something fairly routine at the day job, we do it every day, but the machine that does it runs upward of a million dollars, so it takes some arranging to get it done. I find a shop with the equipment to do it, and they’ll sell me the machine time, but I have to write the program in G code myself, which takes me 7 hours one day to do. The machine time costs me a little over $400. And as I told you then, it was 30/1000 out of center from the front opening bore to the rear case bushing. Or, as I mentioned here in this e-mail

“> Let me see if I can re-line the case. The damage is that the centerline
of
> the case no longer goes through the geartrain, cutting the bell weakens
the
> entire case and the result is it flexes, and this causes the geartrain to
> bind, it's about 30/1000 out, the spec is 5/10,000 so it's pretty bad. I
may
> be able to replace the case bushing and machine it enough to get the
> centerline back, but I'm afraid that if I can (and it's worse than any
I've
> attempted to fix this way, so I"m not sure it can be done, depends on if
> there is enough metal to remove in the bushing) that I'll only be
repairing
> the symptom, not the problem, which is the case is not strong enough
anymore
> to handle the torque without flexing again. Let me see what I can do. I
can
> replace the case, but they run $602.
>
> G”

More next post.....

 

At this time, you tell me that you doubt cutting the bell housing would do this, and of course, considering our relative knowledge of driveline engineering, I carefully consider your well informed opinion and figure the case is still off center by 60 times the allowable deviation, the pump has a shattered gear again the center support is warped (congratulations on that, in 39,765 repairs it’s the first time I’ve seen that one!) and the box is still what we “in the industry” call “scrap”. But you don’t want to buy a case, so as per your request, I replace the pump (again, with a factory new one, but no big deal I have the tooling to re-machine them myself now so that really only nets me out the time on the lathe and $40 for a new gearset) replace the clutch plates, install a rear bushing in the remains of the case and send it home. I also told you at the time I didn’t really expect it to work for long, and you hinted that you were going to sell the truck. Your ethics on that didn’t really surprise me (you posted nude pictures of your ex on a board once, what can I say) and weren’t really my concern. If anyone asked me about it before they bought it, I’d tell them, but I wasn’t taking ads to announce it, it’s SEP in my book….

So, not wanting to waste the four bills I spent on having it probe mapped, I at least use the data I got to make a centerline gauge (pretty neat one too!) and eventually, I take my new "display only" model apart and try it out, and lo and behold the other one is out of center by 22/1000 too! So the good news is you did the R&D for everyone else and we've pretty much validated what I'd suspect for many years, to wit, there is still very limited use for a sawzall in repairing a transmission, and that there is a valid reason for when the day job makes me replace a case when one gets broken.


So, in answer to your question, I really don’t intend to do anything, I’ve been working on cars for 25 years and building a transmission that’s “bullet proof” is not really that hard to do for me, building one “Stupid Proof” is beyond my skills.

G

 

 

Awesome post FT. Hope it all works out for everyone.

 

Welcome back, Joey.

 

Thats classic!

 

It appears that Gregg went WAY BEYOND the call of duty to help you, and you post crap like this? Shame on you!

Tim

 

I'll ask: why the Sawzall? What was being cut away on the bell housing and for what purpose? Who else is cutting on the tranny case?

It's funny that was never mentioned in the original post....

 

So the good news is you did the R&D for everyone else and we've pretty much validated what I'd suspect for many years, to wit, there is still very limited use for a sawzall in repairing a transmission, and that there is a valid reason for when the day job makes me replace a case when one gets broken.


Hailing from Orland Park and representing Sawzall Mod Racing, here's the return of Joey the RTKILLA.

 

Inconceivable !!!!!

 

Excellent info Gregg. These are not the customers anyone wants.

Just last week a customer brought us a th350 out of his circletrack car and the converter housing was cracked 3/4 of the way around. Reason??? He was too lazy to remove his header during the r+r and cut one of those "useless ears" off the side of the case for clearance. Needless to say where the crack originated. Hack!!!

Good call.

 

its SABOTAGE! Rob did it!


Joe never was the sharpest tool in the shed.

 

Even if 1/4 of what Greg Evans wrote is true, he will have my business in the future. That is going way out of the way for a customer in a day and age where everyone is about I, ME, MY, etc. THANKS F.T.!

 

I think he put his tail between his legs and ran away!

Dude, posting nude pics of your ex? ( no comment)


Whenever people ask what mods to put on their truck, I tell them to stat with the FTVB, then go from there.


One of these days I hope to afford a Monster box. I just hope the stock one holds up until then. WHen I order it I hope I can visit Greg's shops and watch the master at work. (He's not too far away).
I know Suavy has had a lot of engine issues, but through it all his Monster Box has NEVER had an issue. He swears by Factory Tech!

 

I too would be curious to see the sawzall mod. Can you post any pics? (maybe the ex too - J/K). I don't follow what benefit there would be in hacking off the bottom of the bell. The crossmember and oil pan hang just as low, so it couldn't be ground clearance.

I could see someone hacking off the "ears" to clear headers or something like that. I would have never thought the extending ears would provide any real additional stifness or reduced flex in the bell - I though they were there for tooling point during the automated driveline assembly in-plant - you know, lifting eyes. Am I wrong on this?

Herb