I know opinions are like, well that other thing, so it is hard to get a definitive concensus on certain mods.

First- Is it better to get a chip with no settings that affect the tranny and a shift kit or no kit and let the chip work the tranny?

Second- The breather issue. This has been bantered around so much I have lost count of the posts. Which setup seems to produce the better results?

The pulley issue seems consistant as does suspension mods.

The tranny and intake mods have me dazed and confused.

Anybody want to take a shot at clearing up these questions?

Thanks,

BTW, I have version 01 of the L's.

 

I'll try to give you answers about the first question.

You didn't tell us what your goals are, so I'll cover both scenarios. The dirty little secret that no one wants to talk about here is that standard chips do kill transmissions. If you want to go as fast as possible with no concern about breaking things, run a standard chip (eliminates the torque reduction, speeds up the shift, increases line pressure) and also run a shift kit.

If you don't want to break it, either run no chip at all or insist on getting one that does not mess with the transmission. Make sure that you leave the torque reduction intact and no line pressure increase or shift duration decrease from the chip. If you want better shifts, do it mechanically with a shift kit. I suggest the use of one like Factory Tech's kit.

Keep in mind that you will have to jump through some hoops to get a chip that does not change the shifting. I don't know why but the tuners only push the "standard chips" and so you have to do some asking to get one that is different. IMHO, chips that don't mess with the shifts should be standard issue for normal, street driving.

 

Good answer.

My goals are to have a daily driver that will go-daddy-go when hammered but not at the expense things breaking and the L being down for extended times.

That's why I am concerned about the tranny. I like the punch of the chip but w/o K/Oing the rest of the drive train.

 

I dont want to start a war here BUT...

There are Thousands and Thousands of Ford Auto transmissions running Superchips and other "standard" chips. If the "standard chips were that big a problem the sheer numbers would mean that we would have tens and tens or hundreds of examples of failed or failing transmissions.

Contrast that with the relatively FEW who have done the Internal Tranny mods and that means that we have a statistically smaller sample to see failures from.

Having said all that - I may be getting a Tranny mod from PSP when my Warranty runs out.

Doug

 

Hey, no War here

It's up to the individual owner. It's just my opinion, based on my own and other L owner's experience, plus extensive research and discussion on this board. I want those who are new to the L to hear a different view than the standard one expressed on this board. Something other than, "chip it and don't worry about it", "it ain't gonna hurt a thing", it will make your transmission last longer."

Specific to thousands of Fords running Superchips, those are not thousands of Lightnings. The Lightning is a differnet animal. We also have some transmission experts around here who have said repeatedly that line pressure should not be changed electonically.

 

No the comments are if you have changed the modulator valve assembly do not add any line pressure via the chip.

Then again each his own...... the transmission holds up well. It's the clutch pack that have the probelm.

 

I just had a JDM line mod valve installed Thursday and my fluid and tranny looked great. The L has 18,000 miles on it. I have been running an R9 (3 months) and JDM Superchip for 14,000 miles. The guy that installed it is a Ford tranny tech and he said my fluid and tranny looked great.

Fast1matt's was installed right before mine and he had a new tranny with 3,000 miles on it. His was in great shape too. Matt said his first tranny was bad from the start and he could tell it. It took 20 something thousand miles to finally give it up. He said when the new tranny was installed that he knew right away it was a good one.

The moral to this story is that the chip is not always to blame. Some transmissions are flakey from the factory and no matter what you do they will go out.

 

sorry you couldn't make it 'down South' Fri. nite. Ran a new 'best' of 13.169@105.00---12s in the fall!

I'm too new at this to answer your questions with any authority but I surely like the way my L runs(daily driver) with its chip. I may get a trans kit later?? I run the oil breather cap and hear no audible pinging--the chip compensates for it. I'll check my intake soon(9,800+ miles) for signs of oil ingestion.

Dan

 

I'm also curious abouth the breater cap. I'll soon be ordering a b/a bolt t-body, and I don't want a pretty little thing like that getting messy .

 

Well, everyone has thier own opinions on that, but that is absolutely untrue. An incorrectly tuned chip can do damage to your transmission, but the chances of it happening are very slim. Sure there are two, maybe three guys here on the boards that have had their trannys fail, and the chip got the blame. The trans in our brand new 01 had to be replaced at 1700 miles. It didn't have anything to do with the chip, it was a misbuilt unit. And there are plenty of guys here on the board, who have close to 40k miles on thier 99s, who have had chips since day one, and use thier trucks for 90% racing, with zero trans problems.

I was one of the earliest people to do serious transmission calibrations on the E4OD trans, back in the mid 90s with the Gen 1s. I had spent hundreds of hours working on transmission calibrations for the early trucks, and because of that, I was asked for some calibration "advice" by the trans engineers on the Gen 2 project, back in late 98. I'm not trying to toot my own horn, I'm just trying to stress that I know a thing or two about this stuff.

I think one of the common misconceptions about raising trans pressure wiping out the units, comes from not a chip, but those "plug-in" modules like those sold by B&M and JET. Those devices plug into your harness and modify the electrical signals to the trans, making it do different stuff. But the method they use, requires taking voltage from one circuit, and giving it to another, which results in higher line pressure, but also less fluid flow to the lubrication ciruit of the trans. Those devices have led to the destruction of MANY units.

The chip on the other hand, has functions, scalars, and tables that control many transmission parameters. Increased shift pressure is achived by increasing pressure through the EPC (electronic pressure control) solenoid. Nothing suffers from this. This is a normal function of the PCM, the chip just happens to tell the PCM to give a little more pressure.

As for the other "modified" areas of the transmission done via chip, those include torque reduction, slip times, % of converter lock up, lock up slip, and many more. These are complex things to be messing with. And most of the chip companies are playing with them. Some of these areas could lead to trans failure if not programmed correctly.

The question at hand was do you do it electrically, mechanically, or both? I like to do both. Use a valve body or shift kit to handle the majority of the accumulator (shift ) pressure, and fine tune the rest with the chip. Try to stay away from "just" doing the modulator valve, as Factory Tech pointed out, it's not a good idea since you don't have matched accumulator bore spring rates, it can cause erractic operation. There is no harm in doing either without the other, but most people are happy with both working together.

Hope this helps clear some stuff up

 

well, add me to those few that have had problems with the chip/transmission..
when i first put in my chip, the WOT 1-2 shift was hella hard. i loved it.
now after being chipped for 10K miles, my 1-2 WOT shift just slides in.. its not firm anymore.
my 2-3 shift is still friggin hard tho.
so now, i'm saving my pennies up to buy all the stuff to fix my tranny. (replacement or upgraded packs)
also gonna go ahead and put in a shift kit, 4x4 tranny pan, and maybe a torque converter.. the discover card people are gonna own me.

i wish there was a way to tell if every pack is bad without opening the tranny.. just so i'd know if there were gonna be any hidden surprises.
i also wish there was a scanner that would tell me that everything else was good.. (ie, torque converter, ect)

i just hope i dont have to pay extra for a chip just to have it leave the tranny alone.

sal - when i do put the shift kit in, what changes need to be made to the program on the chip to accomodate it?
what about the torque converter? any changes?
i really want to make sure that this doesnt happen again.

brooks

 

My L has been chipped since the 700 mile mark. AT 30,000 miles I added the Factory Tech shift kit. Now at 40,000 miles it still shifts great. Very hard at WOT and easy at part throttle.

Jerry

 

When Sal mentioned that there are some with 99's that have over 40K, he was referring to me. I personally have over 600 1/4 mile runs on my L, and over 43K on the odometer. And the ONLY tranny problems that I had and still do is any speed over 130 I have a little slippage....LOL Nothing serious.
But......I also took preaution when I bought my truck. I nstalled a Level 10 shift kit to help with heat a,d also a rather large TRANNY PAN with more fluid capacity for additonal cooling.

Bottom line... Prepare for it, and it will last longer and perfrom better. And of course with more fluid capacity comes more consistent temperatures when your at the track.

Hope this helps.

 

Do our trucks come with tranny coolers? If not, that may be a worthwhile upgrade.

 

btt