Well I finally got my 700R4 yesterday. After a long tiring night (by myself) under the car it's finally in place. I ended up cutting off a couple of mounting ears that I suspect had something to do with the 4X4 pickup it came out of. The most difficult part was trying to maneuver it into place without mangling the dipstick.

It looks like the 2 3/4" I had the driveshaft shortened was about perfect. Bowties "Corvette Yoke" also required an offset u-joint.

The worst job probably was standing on my head installing the new brake light switch with the lockup cutoff.

One small problem I ran into was how to mount the trans temp sending unit. I went to my local parts store today and the guy led me right to a B&M tranny drain plug kit with a 1/8" plug which will fit the sending unit perfectly. I'll use plenty of red loctite here and maybe even weld the nut onto the bushing to be sure it won't ever work loose.

Besides some final wiring and TV setup I only have a couple bigger jobs left. One is to replace the Bubba rubber lines running all the way from the tranny to the cooler with steel.

The other job is to fabricate a new mounting pad on the tranny crossmember. The odd thing about the 700R4 is that although the tranny is almost 3" longer than the old TH400 the mount ends up around 3" closer to the engine. The good part is that the crossmember won't require any mods other than welding on a plate. Right now I'm glad I didn't spent the $200 (for Bowtie's crossmember) for a mod this simple. I'll try to snap a pic of what I do here.

So all in all it's gone pretty well so far. Now if it would just warm up to get rid of the snow and rain to wash all the salt off the roads.

 

boetie sold me a mount that bolted up to my crossmember,looked like a angle bracket

 

I'm not sure if they still have this. There's is nothing like that listed in their online catalog. They never told me they have such a product but I never asked either. I think they'd rather sell you the complete crossmember now.

 

you will like this conversion......its great cruising at 70 at 1700rpm

 

Yes, to say I'm looking forward to this would be an understatement. I'm also drooling over the lower 1st gear and better gas mileage. So far all I can say is that if anyone is considering doing this don't let the installation scare you. It really isn't too bad and is almost a total bolt in if you were to go with Bowtie for everything.

 

i figure on a scale of 1 to 10 for difficulty the swap was about a 5 for difficulty, now on the same scale for the amount of work involved i would rate it at an 8. you may want to put a toggle switch in to control the brake light relay ground circuit so you can unlock the torque converter....you will want to do this on occasion if you drive in the 35-45 mph speeds in 4th gear other wise you find the car lugging at 40mph in 4th. and yes if you step hard on the throttle it will do a forced down shift

 

I may end up doing this. It was your complaints about possible 4th gear lugging that got me looking at this lockup controller and starting this thread.
http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...570&forum_id=3
I'm hoping I won't have as much of a problem with this since I'm running 3.36 rear gears. Also I would think the tranny should downshift, thus disabling the lockup, before the lugging occurs. Maybe that depends on your particular transmission setup.

My tranny guy also got me a vacuum actuated lockup interruptor to disable lockup on acceleration. It may take some toying with to find the best vacuum location and possibly a vacuum delay so that it works at the right time.

 

the hard pedal inputs will always cause the forced down shifts....its the "grandmaing" it that screws with you. in any event its a great upgrade and you will enjoy it. let us know how it works out for you. i don't think the 3.36 will make that much of a difference but i bet the 3.77 range would

 

I think the transmission governor may have something to do with the trans pre-programmed upshift/downshift points, which is why some companies sell a governor reprogramming kit, with different weights.

 

From what I understand it is the TV cable adjustment that controls the shifting of the transmission until wide open throttle. When at wide open throttle it is the governor that dictates the shift points. This is just what I read from a couple of sites on the internet. I have the BTO TV made easy system and it is a wonderful thing. I can just adjust the linkage with an allen head wrench, which changes the shift points in normal driving. I'm not trying to sell you one, but it has helped me out a lot with the 700R4 trans in my 72.

 

that TV adjustable cam set up from BTO is the ulttimate tuning tool.....you should be buying that... its so much fun to play with and it changes the feel of the car

 

 

Well it's in and running! Two long days of wrenching, adjusting, and fabricating. In total I probably spent 3 full days on it. The only thing left now is the TV adjustment but that will have to wait until the roads clear in about a month. It seems like it's the simple things that take the most time. I had to modify the bracket that holds the ignition-shift interlock cable to mount on the pan. Another fun one was getting the right brake lines and bending them for the tranny cooler. The tranny crossmember mount only took a couple of hours to fab up. I'm sure it will all be worth it but right now the anticipation is killing me.

 

just think 70mph at 1700 rpm.....and a first gear that will bring smiles

 

Yeah. And all on a sunny day with the tops off.
She ought to be a real highway cruiser now. I figure between the overdrive and taking the bladder out of the gas tank I've probably doubled my range between gas stops from 150 miles to 300. That should come in handy this summer when the wife and I cross North Dakota and Montana on the way to Glacier Park and Banff. Next year maybe Niagara Falls and New England.

 

i have not noticed a tremendous increase in MPG in around town driving but that could be because of the speed demon and the fact that i doubled the HP at the same time....however if you can get it on the highway for a long period of time you can expect high teens to low 20s

 

I hope you don't mind if I drop in here. I ran across maddog trans. on ebay. He has a video that mentions a "hydraulic lockup with no wiring" have any of you guys heard of this? I am strongly leaning maddog's way because of his prices and this wireless lockup. Thanks, Kevin.

 

I'm so jealous. that is one spectacular scenic trip

 

theres no big deal with the electrical lock up...it a simple circuit