Chevy & GMC Vans

Well my '95 AWD just cooked the tranny. Found a good used one with a 1 year warranty for cheap so gonna go that route and plan to pull the old one out tonight.

Anything I should know going into this? I have done a swap on a '95 rear wheel drive which was a breeze. Should I pull the transfer case and tranny all together or separately?
Anything else I should check or service while I am doing this?

Thanks, gonna be a greasy night, I'm sure!

1995 was an Oddball 1 year only transmission. I hope you took that into account.
B'cuz I dont have a tranny jack, I would be tempted to pull the t-case off first.
Draining both gearboxes first is a bit cleaner...
Good Luck.

I don't have any experience with an AWD tranny.

If your underbody is nasty I suggest you use some DAWN detergent and clean it up a bit first. A clean workspace will keep the stress level at bay. Nothing worse than trying to get the pins, shaft and TC all lined up with greasy hands. Really I wouldn't even think you would need to drain it for any other reason than to shave some weight off.

I suggest you pay VERY close attention to the TC when installing. You are supposed to use a special tool to keep it centered and relieve pressure on the shaft and seal. I use a 1/2" square dowel shaved into a wedge to both hold the TC in and keep it aligned. Also be sure the TC seats properly.





If you've done it before I am sure you are aware of all this. Maybe just a reminder to go slow and do it right...or be F**KED bigtime if you crush the seal.

Good luck!

Thanks for the tips! Got it jacked up now and ready to start wrenching. It's pretty clean underneath, considering the age, but I'm sure it will still be a big mess when all is said and done.
Dirty job but someone's gotta do it, right?

Oh, what type of fluid should I put back in the transfer case? Any better brands? Do I need to drain that?
Done a lot of wrenching in my days but this is actually my first experience involving a transfer case.

The transfer case uses the same fluid as the tranny so you can put regular Dexron 3 or go synthetic if you have it. As long as you have it out, it's a good time to drain and refill it.

Looks like I need to find a place to rent or borrow a torsion bar unloading tool in order to be able to get that crossmember out of the way. The local auto stores are no luck so far. Anyone here ever rent one and if so, where did ya find it???
Last night I got as far as pulling the drive shafts out and removing the transfer case in case I have no choice but to try and sneak the tranny out with the crossmember still in place.

LiftedAWDAstro wrote:The transfer case uses the same fluid as the tranny so you can put regular Dexron 3 or go synthetic if you have it. As long as you have it out, it's a good time to drain and refill it.

I pulled the transfer case out last night and drained it and it looked more like differential oil in there in mine.

For the torsion bar tool, use a large C clamp and remove the flat swivel end. I borrowed these pics from Lockdoc's photobucket album. He had posted them here before.







The BW4472 transfer case you have in your van should be run with standard Dexron 3 transmission fluid. Someone may have put the wrong fluid in there at some point.

LiftedAWDAstro wrote:For the torsion bar tool, use a large C clamp and remove the flat swivel end. I borrowed these pics from Lockdoc's photobucket album. He had posted them here before.







The BW4472 transfer case you have in your van should be run with standard Dexron 3 transmission fluid. Someone may have put the wrong fluid in there at some point.

Thanks for the great photos! Turns out the neighbor had a tool for torsion bars. Going to pick up the new tranny now.

Yay!!!!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1kuqMath3g[/youtube]

The single most important item is the transmission cooler and cooling lines.When a transmission goes bad it can and will leave metal and friction material contamination in the cooler and new hot fluid will push it right into your new replacement causing the risk of new damage.You will need to flush out the system.Napa sell trans flush in an aresol can that works OK if there is no restrictions or you can remove the radiator/trans cooler and take it to be cleaned at a radiator shop or trans shop.
As far as the installation goes the really risky part is keeping the converter all the way in the trans and lining up the pilot smoothly.Working on the floor I would most certainly seperate the trans and t/case.Good Luck

Yea, I did flush the cooler lines real well.

Wanna hear the end of this story now??? Get ready to laugh and feel my pain.

Got the new used tranny in in and filled up, took her for a test drive and it was shifting just the same as the old one which I suspected had a bad electrical problem of some sort at first, until the local tranny shop diagnosed and told me it was bad which led me to do this swap.

So I figured I would try swapping out my computer to see if that made a difference in how the new one shifts since I had a spare computer on hand anyways. When I opened the kick panel to swap the computers, I could see that one of the plastic retainers that keep all the wires locked into the plug had come apart and there was a pink wire that had pulled out of the computer. Plugged that back in and took her for another drive and everything was perfect again.

So, it seems that all the work I did and money spent came down just 1 loose wire! ](*,) ](*,) ](*,)

Well now I have a good spare transmission sitting in my shed and a lesson learned from the school of hard knocks!

Well doesn't that suck! At least you found the issue and know that your spare trans is ready to go. Or...you can learn to rebuild a 4L60E sometime right at home!

LiftedAWDAstro wrote:Well doesn't that suck! At least you found the issue and know that your spare trans is ready to go. Or...you can learn to rebuild a 4L60E sometime right at home!

yea... what you said!

Just feeling super-glad that I didn't give the rebuild shop the go ahead to overhaul it at $2200.00... Now THAT would have really sucked.

MobileCustoms wrote:[Just feeling super-glad that I didn't give the rebuild shop the go ahead to overhaul it at $2200.00... Now THAT would have really sucked.

Imagine how bad it would have felt to pay all that to the shop if the shop just re-connected the wire and said heres your rebuilt tranny! Lol...