Oh Oh! GM 4T65E Shudder in first/second gear!

[i_hate_autofraud]

Hi all,

3 times now I’ve had shudder in the last 2 weeks, never had that before!

History is first 3 years 2009 Impala used to tow trailer by original owner, I took the hitch off.
I drive nice and easy, like a hearse, no burn-outs here!

I’ve had delayed shifts in first and second gear, dealer finally “warranty serviced” it
With a selection of parts, I’ll have to pull notes to see what was replaced. 1 week after
that, delayed / hard shifts returned with a vengeance.

On the "Down Low" while under warranty I replaced the tranny filter and added 2 cans of
Seafoam Trans Tune, worked much better, but not perfect..

Once out of warranty, dropped the pan added TransGo shift kits to shift accumulators, added
8 magnets to pan and to new filter, new ATF and another 2 cans of Seafoam, now nearly perfect,
cleared P1811 code. Odometer is now 138K miles / 222,700 Kms.

>> Any ideas guys on how to handle shudder & what I should do next, ideally a cheap McGuiver fix? Lol

 

[eljefino]

I don't see all that seafoam being great.

 

[oldhp]

Drain, add 1 bottle red lube guard, add factory spec'd oil to full mark. Call it a day. 8 magnets??? Was pan full of metal???

 

[SumpChump]

Our regional tranny shop owner said the Impala trans are his "bread n butter". That they run hot and slam bang shift right into his kids college savings accounts. Just add the lube gaurd red and let her slam till she blows.

 

[carviewsonic]

Hello fellow 4t65e shudder sufferer! Just been going through all that on our 2003 Park Ave, which has 260,000 kms (160k miles). Trans was serviced with pan drop and filter a couple of times over the past 8 years that I have had the car, and it functioned perfectly until about six months ago. Started off as a light shudder when accelerating in second and third gears, has gradually become a much heavier shudder now. So I have tried:
1) Pan drop and filter three months ago (with Maxlife high mileage). No change.
2) Added two tubes Lubegard Shudder fix. No change.
3) Installed Transgo shift kit, and refill with Maxlife fluid. No change.
4) Yesterday, had my mechanic pull the side pan and replace all of the solenoids (he verified with a scan tool that the high pressure solenoid was toast). He said that he also inspected some other components he could get to from the side pan, didn't see anything out of order. Refilled with Maxlife. I added my remaining tube of Lubegard shudder fix.
So far (80 kms mostly highway) a small improvement.

Shudder still remains when accelerating in second and third gear. It's smooth on the highway, and no unusual noises. I went the side pan route as a what the h***, I like the car enough to put $1k into it, but couldn't justify a full $3k trans rebuild. Still would be a shame to see the car scrapped for a bad tranny though. It's in good shape and not a spec of rust, but with this many miles, what else is lurking around the corner?

i_hate_autofraud, If you like the car enough and plan on keeping it a few more years, a tranny rebuild by a reputable shop would make sense. Changing the solenoids is a gamble because of all the labour involved, it didn't work out for me.

 

[901Memphis]

If you have installed the transgo kit just keep the fluid and filter changed and hope for the best. My Buick Century now has been proper triple edge rebuild transmission but prior to that I banged gears hard for two years and it was still driving when I finally replaced it. They have their issues but not any worse than other automatics

 

[Lubener]

You have been bashing these transmissions for some time, you must have known the "day of the rope" was looming.

 

[Trav]

Put a scan tool on this transmission and check the torque converter slippage, any codes?

 

[3800Series]

I've used the shutter fix on my Regal and the symptoms went away for around 11k miles. Its starting to come back after the trip up to Iowa and back to Mississippi but it seemed to work well enough for me.

Before I used it I did drop the pan on my transmission and changed the filter along with 7-ish quarts of atf. I went with maxlife myself. Speaking of which I should probably do another drop and fill again soon.

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Originally Posted By: Lubener
You have been bashing these transmissions for some time, you must have known the "day of the rope" was looming.



True, I've been bashing GM since 4T65E tranny issues are GM inflicted.

However, if GM said "buy our cars but know our FWD trannies will always be bad" at least
that would be honest and I'd step into a time machine and buy a new '87 Chrysler 5th
Ave with 318 V8 and TorqueFlite A727 tranny!

I've driven A904 / A727 for 30 yrs / 1.2 M Kms w/o problems!

My "acid test" is, if I baby it and it still breaks, there's something really wrong!

I wanna love the 4T65E......more so if GM paid for all the Sonnax.com parts needed to fix it!!!

GM could easily do better with $2.50 more in their FWD trannies, but they refuse to!

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Originally Posted By: Trav
Put a scan tool on this transmission and check the torque converter slippage, any codes?



I scanned it 4 days ago, no tranny codes, mind you, I'd need a GM scanner to see everything..

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Originally Posted By: oldhp
Drain, add 1 bottle red lube guard, add factory spec'd oil to full mark. Call it a day. 8 magnets??? Was pan full of metal???


More metal then other 4T65E trannies I filter & ATF seviced, since previous owner towed for 3 years.

More magnets helped for the P1811 code before.

GM put out a TSB on pan magnets, they had a really cheap soft fridge magnet in older trannies and
in the TSB claimed they "got saturated" and the wear metals gravitated to the (magnetic) solenoids
causing shift issues from sticky solenoids.

For me, loading up on mags is a catch-up game to eventually reduce wear metals floating around
in the tranny.

Search " 4T65E magnet " for the TSB

 

[Rand]

Originally Posted By: i_hate_autofraud
Originally Posted By: Lubener
You have been bashing these transmissions for some time, you must have known the "day of the rope" was looming.



True, I've been bashing GM since 4T65E tranny issues are GM inflicted.

However, if GM said "buy our cars but know our FWD trannies will always be bad" at least
that would be honest and I'd step into a time machine and buy a new '87 Chrysler 5th
Ave with 318 V8 and TorqueFlite A727 tranny!

I've driven A904 / A727 for 30 yrs / 1.2 M Kms w/o problems!

My "acid test" is, if I baby it and it still breaks, there's something really wrong!

I wanna love the 4T65E......more so if GM paid for all the Sonnax.com parts needed to fix it!!!

GM could easily do better with $2.50 more in their FWD trannies, but they refuse to!



Right but you are dumping slop in the transmission (seafoam) and it was a tow vehicle.. not like you bought it new so.. your bashing GM is more like trolling GM.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Originally Posted By: eljefino
I don't see all that seafoam being great.


That could be the reason for the problems!

 

[Huie83]

IMO these transmissions have design flaws that make them shift like [censored] when they get higher miles. The shift solenoids are magnetic and build up with metal. The magnet TSB came out to try and solve that by getting more metal out of the fluid.

The 4T65E in my 2010 Impala has been gimpy since around 80K miles, it has 118K on it now. around 80K it started to flare and get lazy from 2-3,3-4. I've added the second magnet per the TSB and done 4 drain and refills as well as a new delco filter. I also did the trans-go shift kit at its last drain/fill @ 100K. Heck of a lot better than it was, but still randomly bangs into 1st from a start. No more shift flares though.

I tried Lubeguard Red a few drains back and it made it worse. Valvoline Maxlife ATF instead Dexron VI has improved the shifting a lot for me.

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Originally Posted By: Rand
Originally Posted By: i_hate_autofraud
Originally Posted By: Lubener
You have been bashing these transmissions for some time, you must have known the "day of the rope" was looming.



True, I've been bashing GM since 4T65E tranny issues are GM inflicted.

However, if GM said "buy our cars but know our FWD trannies will always be bad" at least
that would be honest and I'd step into a time machine and buy a new '87 Chrysler 5th
Ave with 318 V8 and TorqueFlite A727 tranny!

I've driven A904 / A727 for 30 yrs / 1.2 M Kms w/o problems!

My "acid test" is, if I baby it and it still breaks, there's something really wrong!

I wanna love the 4T65E......more so if GM paid for all the Sonnax.com parts needed to fix it!!!

GM could easily do better with $2.50 more in their FWD trannies, but they refuse to!



Right but you are dumping slop in the transmission (seafoam) and it was a tow vehicle.. not like you bought it new so.. your bashing GM is more like trolling GM.


The Seafoam slop worked in this case and reduced shift delay, it can't work for all problems, for sure.
At the time I wasn't eager to take a chance on a tranny additive, but it did work in this case.

I bought the Impala as a 3 yr old off the GM dealer lot and paid plenty cash, in good faith, it wasn't
presented as a junker or fixer upper.

A way newer GM should have a tranny at least as good as a 70s or 80s A727 / A904

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Thanks bro for your experiences / input!

 

[Lubener]

Originally Posted By: i_hate_autofraud
Originally Posted By: Lubener
You have been bashing these transmissions for some time, you must have known the "day of the rope" was looming.



True, I've been bashing GM since 4T65E tranny issues are GM inflicted.

However, if GM said "buy our cars but know our FWD trannies will always be bad" at least
that would be honest and I'd step into a time machine and buy a new '87 Chrysler 5th
Ave with 318 V8 and TorqueFlite A727 tranny!

I've driven A904 / A727 for 30 yrs / 1.2 M Kms w/o problems!



Those were the good old days. Nothing today is as good as that Chrysler pair.

 

[R18Civic]

Well [censored]. I must be lucky, my 4t65e shifts as good as the day I bought the Buick. Of course I dropped the pan twice around 42k, more recently at 119k.

I remember last June when we hit the 90s for the first time I had TCC flutter under partial throttle while moving at 30-50mph. Went away a couple days later.

Using torque pro all my shifts only take .2-.3 seconds at 122k. Have yet to check tcc lockup.

 

[i_hate_autofraud]

Originally Posted By: Hemispheres
Well [censored]. I must be lucky, my 4t65e shifts as good as the day I bought the Buick. Of course I dropped the pan twice around 42k, more recently at 119k.

I remember last June when we hit the 90s for the first time I had TCC flutter under partial throttle while moving at 30-50mph. Went away a couple days later.

Using torque pro all my shifts only take .2-.3 seconds at 122k. Have yet to check tcc lockup.



What's Torque Pro? I'd like to check it out! Thx