New build thread; 48 Plymouth

[falconvan]

Very nice! That has to be a great feeling. I saw this on Mother's Day. I thought of you so I jumped out and took some pics for ya.

Nice! Cant go wrong with red; looks like they did a really nice job on it.

[stovens]

I see a future car club forming!

[falconvan]

Ok all you transmission gurus. I've got a weird problem going on. The trans is a 700R4 with a Hughes converter and a constant pressure valve body. It shifts great but what's going on is after about 20 minutes of driving I start getting a chirp-chirp that sounds just like a belt noise. Pretty soon it turns into a squealing noise at idle (just like a belt) and then to constant squeal throughout the RPM range. I thought the serpentine belt tensioner spring was getting weak until I pulled the belt off while the engine was hot, started it with no belt, and realized the noise is coming from down by the torque converter. Shut the car off and let it cool down and the noise goes away until everything heats up again. Anyone ever had a transmission do this??

[40FordDeluxe]

Could you have a front pump bushing issue? I've seen it happen on TH350s and TH400s. The bushing will stick to the converter and cause the noises you're describing. Sometimes they don't make any noise and it gets hot and takes out the seal and then you find it.

[falconvan]

I was afraid of that; sounds like the trans needs to come back out. Guess I know one project I'll be doing over the winter.

[stovens]

Bummer. Keep us posted

[34_40]

I think Ryan nailed it. The convertor journal "grows" with the temperature and is losing it's clearance with the bushing.

If the pump cover is cast iron, you may be ok, If it's aluminum, the bushing will probably gall the I.D. and warp the cover. You've probably stopped using the car for the season.. if not, I would, until you can verify the problem

I can't swear I heard exactly the noise you describe, but I have heard a high pitched squeal from a tranny, it had just been rebuilt and the convertor journal od was larger than an original and removed to much clearance in the bushing. It was a th 350 with a hughes convertor.

[falconvan]

Makes perfect sense. She's in dry dock for the winter so I'll pull it and verify.

[falconvan]

The Plymouth is back on the operating table; I pulled the trans last night and am going to fix a few things over the winter that weren't quite right. My wife hates the front seats so I'm selling those and having a different pair recovered to match, the trans is getting fixed, the speedometer stopped working so that's getting fixed, the brakes always had a pulsing that I'm going to work on, and I need to raise the back end some as the driveshaft is hitting the floor under hard acceleration. It's been covered up the whole time I was building the van so it was nice to see it again.

[falconvan]

Got my trans back today; looks like the shop that originally put it together did not internally wire the lockup for the converter and it smoked the converter. Luckily no damage to the trans itself so all they had to do besides wire the lockup was flush some debris out and it's good to go with a new converter.

[34_40]

That's good news on the trans. I wonder how the car will react with the lockup feature working now? In theory it should help the MPG.

[firebird77clone]

Funny that.

I drove my 69 chevelle for years with the converter not wired up and no problems. (700 R4)

I wonder what made the difference?

[40FordDeluxe]

Funny that.

I drove my 69 chevelle for years with the converter not wired up and no problems. (700 R4)

I wonder what made the difference?

The constant pressure valve body in Pat's trans was probably the big difference between his and yours and why his converter did this. They tend to get hot at higher rpm's and flatten the fins in the converter and become inefficient.

That's great to hear it didn't hurt the trans. A lot of times the converter bearings come apart and get in the trans and reak havoc on the fluid etc.

.

[falconvan]

Could be; I'm just glad I didn't have to go through a complete rebuild again. It'll be nice to get it back on the road next spring.

[falconvan]

Trans is back in and I got my seats back from the upholstery guy and installed. Also took my speedometer out and shipped it off to get repaired. I’ve got several little things to fix over the winter; it’ll be great to have a lot of the bugs worked out.