Just Fishing's 09 Tahoe Build thread

[iamdub]

I took some old sockets yesterday morning, chocked them in a drill and started sharpening.

First attempt = fail.
I need the edges to be perfectly flat for press use.

I tried to stamp on leather, cardboard, and wood.

I got the best results going directly against steel.

So a few more attempts to make a stamper.

After a few more attempts, i finally figured something that works.

I grind the inside edge of a 12pt socket until ot meets with the beveled outside edge.

Depending if this is an inside or outside cut seems to matter for the quality of the stamping.

For the inside edge (the one i can't really use tin snip for).

I use an oversized socket, once i have a good edge against the outside bevel, i then take the outside and use the drill and run it against a belt sander.

So far the hardest part is getting the outside stamping perfectly aligned with the inside stamping.

I'll snap some pictures once i get the official shim stock.

For now i have been doing this with some aluminum .020 scrap.

I need this to be about .010ish.

So i have some copper and brass shim coming.
Then i also found some .004 stainless shim stock.

This is stuff that they say can be delivered by this weekend.

I'm hoping to use the stainless stuff, but I'll settle for the brass.

Where this stuff will sit, brass shoud be fine.

Why not just buy a couple packs of these?

McMaster-Carr

McMaster-Carr is the complete source for your plant with over 595,000 products. 98% of products ordered ship from stock and deliver same or next day.

www.mcmaster.com

Other options:

McMaster-Carr

McMaster-Carr is the complete source for your plant with over 595,000 products. 98% of products ordered ship from stock and deliver same or next day.

www.mcmaster.com

Washer, Shim .250 OD X .187 ID x .010 Thickness, 300 series SS, Part# M5000-24700

Buy Washer, Shim .250 OD X .187 ID x .010 Thickness (inch), 300 series SS, Part# M5000-24700 Medical Fastener on online at great prices from stock.

www.mackfasteners.com

 

[Tonyrodz]

Happy belated Birf-day.

 

[Just Fishing]

Ty ty

And yesterday I received my shim stock.

My little socket stamp idea failed against the harder brass sheet.

I think the cheap socket i used was just too soft.

I really didn't like how it deformed the sheet anyways...

To do this correctly, i would really need some way to support both sides, and then punch it out.

So the next idea, open the inner hole slowly as to not deform the sheet.

Then carefully trim the outside edge to get the desired shape.

Took me a good 3 trys before i got something i liked.

Then re checking the end play, i came up with the idea to use some 1/4in mild steel scrap.
I used one of the bell housing bolts to overlap and hold down the plate in order to get some place for the dial caliper to hold onto with its magnetic clamp.

The idea worked perfectly.

Turns out i had closer to .020 endplay.

So that .010 sheet + some of the .004 shim stock, and I'm looking much better.
About .006 endplay now.

I'll probably do one more shim to see if i can do a tiny bit better.
Then I'll run with the better of the two.

Next i get to finalize the transmission.
Includes new teflon turbine shaft seals.

Those can be interesting, and while i do have some special toola for the 4l60, i found a funnel to expand the seal, and then some electrical tape to compress works every bit as good.

So that's my plan here.

Once i have the transmission assembled, then i air check once more.

And then dig into the valve body.
The valve body doesn't need anything other than a cleaning, and inspection.

The valve body and pressure switches were rebuilt back in 2020/2021.

I'm probably going to carefully inspect the laminates and replace the switch seals for good measure...

 

[Just Fishing]

Why not just buy a couple packs of these?

McMaster-Carr

McMaster-Carr is the complete source for your plant with over 595,000 products. 98% of products ordered ship from stock and deliver same or next day.

www.mcmaster.com

Other options:

McMaster-Carr

McMaster-Carr is the complete source for your plant with over 595,000 products. 98% of products ordered ship from stock and deliver same or next day.

www.mcmaster.com

Washer, Shim .250 OD X .187 ID x .010 Thickness, 300 series SS, Part# M5000-24700

Buy Washer, Shim .250 OD X .187 ID x .010 Thickness (inch), 300 series SS, Part# M5000-24700 Medical Fastener on online at great prices from stock.

www.mackfasteners.com

Yup, this is what i needed a week ago.

Very nice find.

I didn't look at prices, but if i was to ever build a few of these.

Some different thickness shims would be quite valuable to have on hand.

 

[Just Fishing]

If this goes well, hopefully i can get the transmission installed this weekend.

Otherwise, it's probably going to be a next weekend task.

 

[Just Fishing]

I got the new Teflon seals installed onto the turbine/input shaft.

my 4l60 tool is wrong, these seals are much bigger.
so I resorted to a funnel.

I got them just big enough to fit into the grooves.

Start at the bottom and work your way up carefully.
Once on, work in with the fingers.
then loosely wrap with electrical tape, and then start adding tension.

once wrapped, work more with your fingers to get them to shrink.
I unwrapped, then did another round...
I'll let this sit overnight.



When I did this on my 4l60, I was very happy with the results.
Trick is to get them far enough in to not shave any Teflon off when assembling, but loose enough to get a real nice seal in the pump.


I noticed the original ones looked pretty dang good, and the sealed fine during air checks.
but they were a little loose fitting, like up and down...

Installing the new seals, the difference is obvious.
They were still sealing, but they were very worn.

 

[pwtr02ss]

I got the new Teflon seals installed onto the turbine/input shaft.

my 4l60 tool is wrong, these seals are much bigger.
so I resorted to a funnel.

I got them just big enough to fit into the grooves.

Start at the bottom and work your way up carefully.
Once on, work in with the fingers.
then loosely wrap with electrical tape, and then start adding tension.

once wrapped, work more with your fingers to get them to shrink.
I unwrapped, then did another round...
I'll let this sit overnight.

View attachment 368097

When I did this on my 4l60, I was very happy with the results.
Trick is to get them far enough in to not shave any Teflon off when assembling, but loose enough to get a real nice seal in the pump.


I noticed the original ones looked pretty dang good, and the sealed fine during air checks.
but they were a little loose fitting, like up and down...

Installing the new seals, the difference is obvious.
They were still sealing, but they were very worn.

That's exactly how I did the Teflon's on the very first 4l60 we built. Worked great but was a pita compared to the tool. I wrapped some thin cardboard around them the snugged that up with the tape. I also made my own lip seal tool out of a bic ink pen and welding wire after the tool we bought broke. Worked better than the purchased tool

 

[Just Fishing]

I got the transmission together, pictures coming soon...
Doing end play testing, I ended up putting some gouges i didn't like in the pump bushings.
brand new pump, so I still had a set from my kit.

So I got those replaced.
Then I had to disassemble my pump to clean and then re-assemble.

For the final install, I used transgel to lube the fk out of the splines to prevent that from happening again.

I got the 1-2-3-4 whatever drum installed the first go try pretty smoothly.

Then I had this one bushing I replaced with a sonnax one.
it felt so loose, but I decided it's fine..

Then it was nagging at me...

So I was like fk it, pulled everything apart to be 100% sure.

Yeah, it was fine.

then I spent the next hour fighting that drum back in.
I tried this trick where you use wire get space to work the drum, yeah that was a nightmare.
my wire was too thin, and I couldn't find the coat hanger I set aside just for this.


I finally got it by using the turbine shaft and the 1-2-3-4 drum on there like one of the build videos...
such a pita


to protect my seals, I packed the trans gel in there.
tons of it.

just got done doing an air check where it was giving me some weird results.

So i spent some time with the transmission fluid and a cap to carefully pour it into the little holes to lube things up.
Once the transmission fluid started loosing up the trans gel, things are working much better.



Anyways, migrane right now.
Probably from the brake clean.




Me take a break and then i want to start on the valve body after i air check again to be 110% sure I got it done right.

 

[Just Fishing]

Got the engine re-painted a few days ago.
This time w/o the clear coat (that looks terrible when it yellows against the silver base)

Had more "Bling" w/o the clear coat.

This time it was painted with the heads in place and the valley cover in place.
I taped off the aluminum parts to keep them bare aluminum.

I'll probably do one more coat with the old bell housing installed when I have it on the hoist.
Assuming of course that I actually remember.




Notice my collection of cardboard on the right.

Trying to save the larger pieces for when I reassemble everything.
So much better than laying on the bare concrete, even with an epoxy coating.

The concrete is always the wrong temperature.

 

[Just Fishing]

For the transmission,
This is my .010 shim


I made it by drilling a hole in the center, then filed it out to fit a cutting bit in there.
Then slowly ground away material.

I used the old thrust bearing that will sit on top to scribe the basic shape/size
Then following what I could make out of the official superior branded shims, I sized it to fit into the recess

It's not perfect, but it's perfectly flat, and it doesn't "float" when in place.

I was tempted to try one more time to see if i could get it even better but decided I didn't want to spend another hour making it.

I did the same with the .004 shim, that one was a little harder to work with, but it turned out pretty good.
A little tight on the center shaft, but thin enough to flatten out with some light tapping...

Then I found another set of end play specs for the 6l80

From a builder, he says .015 - .010

So, I dumped the .004 shim
better to run too loose than too tight.

In the manual, it just says "no noticeable end play"
And that's what I have.
I can't feel any sort of "clunk".
Only measurable via a dial caliper.

The concern would be the plastic spacer on the pump.
If i get it too tight, I'll melt and damage that spacer.