Project SicMonte

[SicMonte]

So if you all remember, last year at this time I broke my trans up at Run To The Shore. IUt turned out that the front pump sheared off and sent metal fragments all through the trans and it was just a horrible sight.

So I had the mother of all 200r4's built, one that could take the heat and abuse of a day at the autox, a track day at Mid Ohio with Danny Pop as your instructor, a SCCA Hill Climb event in 98 degree weather, and even a serious thrashing at an American Streetcar Series event. This bad boy trans had the works. It had a billet front drum and input shaft, hardened sun gears, billet servo, billet output shaft, "blue" bands, heavy duty clutch packs, Pro Torque Converter, even had -6 braided lines going to a huge Derale cooler with a fan on it, and a semi deep PML aluminum pan with cooling fins on it (thanks Tom!!!). After every event I had the trans fluid flushed with GM Dex VI fluid (perk of having a shop). The trans did great all summer and fall........that is until this weekend.

This weekend I planned to drive the car to the bi annual Cruising Ocean City MD weekend. I do this weekend twice a year and it is hot rod heaven! Car was running great until I had to stop to pay a toll at the bridge. When I accelerated from the stop it sounded and felt like I was running over a set of rumble strips. I didnt feel it again until about 45 minutes later when I was in a town and hit some stop lights. At each light the same thing happened when I left from the light. Then at the fourth or fifth light I noticed that the car wouldn't move forward when I let off the brake. I gave it gas and it wouldn't shift at all and had maybe 1% power. I was taching out the motor to just get it off the road and into a gas station. It has reverse but nothing in the forward gears.



So naturally I called the trans builder and was like....ummmmmmmm. Of course he says its the torque converter. So I called the converter company and they say that its definitely the trans. Oh man here we go. I called back the trans guy and he said that he would look it over to see whats going on for free.

So my plan is to pull the trans out and send it to him. In the mean time I am going to just bite the bullet and do a T56 swap. This will most likely stay on the SBC since I am on a pretty tight budget. We shall see....