On Sat, 23 Jun 2018 15:13:33 -0700 (PDT), Its Me wrote:

I thought I might post something different than the usual whiny, liberal BS that FH posts here, so here goes...

I have a 1989 chevy 1500 truck that is my "yard truck". You know, it takes off trash, goes to Lowes, the gardening center, that sort of thing. It has 165k miles on it. I bought it from my FIL, who bought it new.

My son needed some transportation while his truck was down, so he borrowed it. Sure enough, the transmission died while he had it. I checked around, and shops wanted about $2800 to put in a rebuilt 700R4 transmission. That would double the value of the truck! I had it towed back to my house.

So while I have a shop with a 4 post lift, it's tied up with my '70 Torino on it. So I jacked it up on 6 ton jackstands with 4 ton jackstands for backup, and with a floorjack proceeded to pull the tranny. Laying on my back on a creeper and on cardboard, on concrete. No fun.

Found a place that would take my core tranny and $700, and give me a freshly rebuilt 700R4. Borrowed a friends truck, and made it happen. Done.

Got it back home and enlisted a friend's help to re-install. (Time to blow harry's mind. He's a Marine. A Marine sniper. Was deployed in the Mid-East. And he's BLACK!! The Horror.) LOL

What a Pain In The Ass. Not only did it take about 6 hours total to re-install it due to GM's poor design, but we also had another issue. In trying to get the tranny dipstick tube positioned to lift the tranny back into place (a PITA that took many tries) I suddenly had a trickle of fluid coming down the block. It was coolant. GM used (for about 10 years) a quick disconnect fitting on the left rear of the intake manifold for feeding the heater core. A hard line plugged into it, then it changed to a heater hose to connect to the heater core fitting sticking out of the firewall. It was done to save time on the assembly line, and they used cheap pot metal to make the fitting. Mine was corroded and ugly, but not leaking. The dipstick tube hit it and snapped it off flush with the manifold.

Today I used a tool that was specially designed to help remove this specific issue in GM's engines. Yes, at least two manufacturers make a tool specially designed to get the part out of the manifold that typically breaks of in these 350 GM engines. Only it didn't work. It is kind of like an EZ Out, but it ended up just stripping out the pot metal and leaving a ring in the threads. A hacksaw blade, small flat bladed screwdriver, hammer and some patience got the rest out. Chased the threads with a tap, then black RTV and a 3/4 hose nipple with new heater hose and clamps completed the repair. Screw the quick disconnect.

So the old girl is back on the road. Now if I could only get the rear view mirror to stay glued onto the windshield for more than a year or so at a time.

Way to git 'er done!