Hey everybody, just putting the question out there but, to give some background on the transmission, i bought my first 2002 f-350 crew cab 7.3 4x4 with 139,000 miles on it when i was 19, six years ago which is when i first found this website, hence every since its been my bible. anyway last october with 220,000 miles on it, i started having injector issues, so having some extra coinage stashed i put in a new set of stage 2 full force alliants injectors. The torque converter came apart internally the very next day with 112 miles on my second test drive. it filled the pan and the rest of the transmission with shavings ofcourse so we dissassembled the trans completely and rebuilt it, all the hard parts still looked good at the time so we reused them, used all new clutches and steel's, all new gaskets and seals, the works basically. added a transgo tugger kit, new hd converter. put it together and it was beautiful till february. i hit a patch of black ice and rolled it four times, totaling it. so, all this money and time, i had to make a decision, a new diesel, or go find another treasure. So i ended up finding a 2001 ford f-350 crew cab lariat 7.3 4x4 with 109,000 miles on it in south dakota. i hopped the next flight, checked it over front to back and drove it 1500 miles home to new york. converted everything over from my 2002, injectors, tranny, tuning, gauges, stereo, even swapped over the rear sway bar as my 02 had one but not this identical 01? interesting. anyway, tranny held strong for 25,000 more miles, as i've put that much on it since the swap, so with 35,000 miles on the transmission, on my way to pick up a customer i felt it almost neutral out, hit the gas, it revved up like it was in neutral and would just ease forward. put it in park, put it back into drive and everything was fine. drove it another 500 miles or so with just a slight delay going into drive or reverse. obviously new i had a problem and why bother messing around so i pulled it and the clutches were dished and the overdrive planet was toast. So totally rebuilt it front to back, new overdrive planet, new clutches and steels, the whole nine yards. put it back in and it was the best feeling transmission yet lol. out of my collection. anyway, everythings been perfect all along till i made this 200 mile trip yesterday and this is 2000 miles into this rebuild. going down the highway at 74 i watched the temp gauge slowly climb to 220. i was very frustrated with it and as soon as i saw the gauge break 140 degrees i knew something was bad. made it into the city, delivered the trailer everything shifting and working fine. made the 100 mile trip home and when i got off the exit and came to a stop at the intersection. there was nothing when i hit the gas, she just revvd up. so i sat there for a few seconds wondering what to do as the cars piled up behind me. i slapped the tuner into tune 2 which is my shift tune and the transmission started working fine. it shifts fine all through the gears till it goes into over drive and then it slipps into over drive. i know the heat ruined the clutches and steels causing that but i got it home and in the drive way, checked fluids its fine ofcourse, put it in tune 1 my 80hp econo tune and theres no forward gear whatsoever, just revese. put it into tune 2 or three my shift tune or my race tune and the trans shifts perfect till overdrive when it slips in. anyway i'm gonna pull it and rebuild it again, almost have enough saved for a BTS or JW transmission, just hoped i could get a good reliable rebuild myself. anyway, so my question is, any idea why theres driveability in a shift or race tune, but not in an econo tune? i also just wanted to share my story so thanks for reading! Thanks for any and all advice and comments guys! and after this i still love my 7.3 and wont turn back lmao

 

I don't really know, but as a "Bump" and a thought on the tune but possibly bumping up line pressure in tunes.

 

yeah that's what I was thinking, I'm not really sure what else the tuning would change besides bump up line pressure I just thought it was interesting. it's hard to believe whatever bump up in line pressure it's giving causes forward movement to come back lol but it does. I just feel kind of bad because it's downshifting in my tune 2, so it goes from nothing at all in tune 1 to everything including downshifting in tune 2 lol. weird..

 

It makes sense to me.

If you have a bad seal the clutch won't apply unless you raise line pressure. That will also increase volume of fluid to the clutch, and if the seal isn't TOO bad it will apply.

All of this is academic, really. I'm fairly sure you have a failed transmission that needs to be rebuilt or replaced.

 

yep thats exactly whats going on, it makes perfect sense. not quite sure what initially caused all the heat which caused all this but we'll find out this weekend. ive got some billet parts and an upgraded accumulator and valve body on the way for this weekend so we'll tear it down and try it again with a little more beef in its taco.

 

As I am going through my tugger II kit and going by the directions I am finding the drill here and move check ***** a bit disturbing. Then reading these results really scares me.

 

I know it sounds elementary.

When you did your tear downs, did you do a full system flush of the entire system.


I know of quite a few instances where debris from the failed was lodged in the lines and cooler and completely evaporated a fresh build.

Denny

 

Sorry I forgot to update guys, to answer your questions, moving check *****, and drilling plates was scary but its a necessity for changing your shift firmness and points among other things like changing the springs too. I also did flush the tranny lines and transmission cooler for my rebuilds, I ran three cans of KoolerKleen thru the system thinking that I had left some particulate behind causing my transmission melt down previous to that bad rebuild, we didn't really find the cause of why it did end up terminating, but the fix all to end all for my was ordering an Enforcer 4 Combo Kit from PATC.com which also came with a billet converter. I have a little over 6,000 miles on this rebuild with some heavy tows already. I debated a long time whether to just buy a BTS or something along those lines and said screw it, I'll try it one more time. I'm very glad I did as it added 21 more clutches and steels through the whole tranny. It shifts almost as nice as a 5r110w now. I love it. It definitely one hundred percent puts the power to the tire's now. What a difference, coulda, shoulda, woulda done this rebuild first if I had known better. I hope this helps you guys out and as always thanks for your support! Powerstroke on!