Well this weekend I made it out to the junkyard to start pulling everything for a 5-speed swap. I took a friend with me which made it go a lot faster. He worked on the interior parts while I pulled the transaxle and under hood components. It was half price day and it was pretty busy, and when we got there another guy was wrenching on the car. Turns out he was pulling a passenger side axle. I thought he was going to take the whole assembly with intermediate shaft but luckily he left that.

I'll either hit up the yards again or just buy a reman from NAPA. Does anyone know if the 284 axles are the same, since there's a high mileage 3.4L GP in a different yard? The one side I did get didn't have the ABS tone ring, so I may just get two remans and use the one I've got as a core.

Here's what I got:


I haven't checked on my TGP or Cutlass, but after the fact I was thinking I probably didn't need the whole support assembly for the pedals, did I? Oh well, it was a pain in the arse to get out but it was my friend working on that and not me.  :laugh:


Only down side that I ran across after getting it out is that the clutch release lever for the throw out bearing ended up being damaged/worn. After a little research this seems like a somewhat common issue and I can either buy a new one from a parts store or get one from another used trans, which may not be worth the effort on my part to pull another one.











I'm guessing that's what put the car in the yard. It had a for sale sign with a name and number in the back seat and I was thinking about calling the previous owner. The car was a '90 GP SE with the 3.1L and it had a tick over 120k miles. The axles felt snug with no movement and the differential pin looks like it has extremely little wear. Overall not bad for well under a couple hundred bucks including a warranty (and that also included a cylinder head I bought my friend for helping pull everything).

Much thanks. Hopefully the donor car is still there, since I'm heading up this afternoon to start stripping everything out of it with a friend. Got to love the half price days at the junk yard.  :icon_mrgreen:

Quote from: TurboSedan on February 02, 2004, 09:40:23 PM
you will need to drill a hole for the shifter cables , and modify the hole in the firewall to the right of the brakes booster into a slightly larger square hole so you can mount the clutch master cylinder.  i would reccomend using a Dremel with the 18" flexshaft and a tungsten carbide cutter.  be very careful tho that bit will slice thru the firewall no problem!  make small cuts and test fit the m/c often.  you can see what shape the hole must be by just looking at the end of the clutch master cylinder that goes into the firewall (kinda hard to explain...).  everything else is bolt on and straightforward.  i have not yet installed my TSTE motor so i really can't help ya with the turbo support bracket or memcal stuff.  good luck.
joshua

To bump an old thread, this Saturday I'm going to strip a '90 GP in the junk yard of it's 282 5-speed. Other than what was already listed, are there any other small parts that would be good to pick up? Also the links are dead and I thought I saw some similar pics somewhere on the web before. Does anyone have or knows a link to anything that shows the modifications made for the cables and firewall?

I've heard that rumor, but the hydraulic version of the F7 came out a couple years before the TGP and the partial electronically controlled version for the Allante came out the same years as the TGP. I bet the Hydramatic division interchanged some parts, but it almost makes me wonder if it was the other way around.

Well I'm coming back to trying to find a good rebuilder in southern California again or doing a 5-speed swap. I found a couple W-body 5-speeds in the junk yards this weekend. One was a Getrag 284 car ('91 Grand Prix, 3.4L DOHC), but it had 209k miles! That's one of the higher mileage TDC cars that I've ran across and the shift linkage didn't feel too good. The mileage combined with non-existant parts had me moving on. At another place I found another GP with a Getrag 282 behind a 3.1L, but I couldn't get the mileage off it. If it's there next weekend I might pull everything off it.

It's too bad the 4T80E is so big and has incompatibilities like the starter location, because I'm running across more and more Northstar V8's in the yards now. I wonder if any internals can be used to upgrade the 4T60/65-family? It's expensive but there's aftermarket options to control them now (http://www.powertraincontrolsolutions.com/content-4.html for example), and there should be less expensive options if the Megasquirt do-it-yourself stand alone (http://www.msefi.com/ or http://www.megasquirt.info/) auto trans support comes out in a few revisions. For the price of a good rebuild I wonder if I could track down a new 4T65E behind one of the new V8 W-bodies and pick up an aftermarket controller. Or do the 5-speed swap... So many choices and none of them optimal or cheap. :laugh:

Since I already have a TGP and mentioned I was going to put a new trans in it, I doubt I'm going out and buying a Caddy to pull the engine from the TGP and put in that. ;)  As for why I'd consider the F7? Two words: torque capacity. I could care less about how it shifted since shift kits are a lot less expensive than building up a transaxle to handle more power. The options for non-electronically controlled GM automatics that will stand up to the torque of a modified TGP, let alone stock, is very small.

As for the F7 trans, I was able to find some more information on my own. The one I'm looking at is from a '91 and is apparently partially electronically controlled (kind of a hybrid between a 4T60 and a 4T60E with a mix of special HD parts thrown in). The earlier F7's from '87-88 were the only ones that were fully hydraulically controlled but also didn't feature as much revisions (they were used with the smaller 4.1L V8's that produced less power than the 4.5L version in the 89-92 cars).

So while the trans I was looking at won't work, my question still remains. I'd be interested in hearing if anyone has tried an early F7 behind the turbo 3.1 or any other high output engines.

I've been doing some searches and found one of my first posts and hadn't realized that my TGP has been sitting for a year and a half now. Time flies. :laugh:  Anyways, to give a quick recap I picked up a low mileage red '90 TGP with a bad trans that has lost 3rd and OD. I've been going back and forth over doing a 5-speed conversion or stay with an automatic and had a question on the automatics.

I've found a local THM F7 from a late model Cadillac Allante with the 4.5L V8. The F7 is the heavy duty version of the 4T60 that they used up until '93 (when the Northstar V8/4T80E combo became available for that last year). I was wondering if anyone has any experience trying one in TGP. The Allante with the 4.5 was rated at 200 hp, 270 ft-lbs of torque and the car itself was a couple hundred pounds heavier. I'm thinking it might be a good match and from what little I can tell the actual transaxle is somewhat similar to the TGP's HD 4T60.

Also as a side note, it looks like there is at least one aftermarket stand-alone electronic module to control the later electronic versions of the 4T60E/4T65E's now. It would be an expensive combination, but the new Grand Prix GXP with the small block V8 is putting down north of 320 ft-lbs through it's 4T65E. That and I've been curious if any of those new internals are backwards compatible as upgrades to the 4T60. I haven't been able to find any new info and good performance builders for this family of transaxles seems hard to come by.

Quote from: idbeastAny series 1 3800 tranny is a 4T60E or a 4T65E and they won't work.

That's what I was pretty sure. I wish I had more time to check out the Regal I was looking at. I was stamped as a 4T-60 on the bottom of the pan and I didn't see any of the electrical connectors for the solenoids. Odd.

I might go straight to a 5-speed just to get it on the road. I guess I'll have to see if anyone can help me with a chip to get it running right with the stick. On a side note, I saw a rebuilder over in Phoenix selling stuff on eBay recently and it caught my eye because they were listing one as a "440T4/4T60 Heavy-duty". It's only a few hours away so I might give them a call and see what's up with it and if they're knowledgeable in what they're doing.

By the way, I'm in southern California. Thanks for the help and suggestions.

First I guess I should start off by introducing myself. This is my first post over here but I've been surfing the forums for a while now. I just picked up a one owner, 63k mile red '90 TGP that's in overall very nice shape. I've also got a few other GM's and a "couple" turbo Dodge's as well.

My new TGP needs a new accumulator for the PowerMaster III, but the major reason I got a good deal on it was that the trans is pretty much gone. It's still got first and second, but when it tries to shift into third it drops to neutral. Which brings me to my question.

I'm thinking about doing a 5-speed swap in the future, but for now I might consider another auto. I missed out on another TGP in a local junkyard, and was wondering where I could find another HD 4T60 that will work. I'm guessing the ones from a FWD Caddy V8 (~1990-ish) as well as from another TGP. What I can't find is if all the 4T60's used in the first gen Series I supercharged 3800's were electronically controlled? The one behind my twin dual cam 3.4L in my old '91 Olds Cutlass Supreme International was a 4T60-E HD. Are there any other options/sources that I missed?

The only thing I've found recently is a 45k mile 4T60 (non -E) behind a regular Series I 3800 (non-S/C) for a decent price. They said it was from a '92 Buck Regal sedan, but I thought that by '92 all 3800's got an -E version.

Any opinions? Suggestions? Thanks.