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mhburton
January 22nd, 2010, 04:55 AM
Hey guys, I have a question for my first post to the group.
First some background on me. I don't mechanic for a living, but am a Master Electrician working on industrial process control equip in a natural gas treating plant. I was born and raised in the West Texas Oil Fields and fortunate enough to have a Dad that showed me how to fix my own bicycle as soon as I learned how to ride it as well as the car, etc. as I got older and he taught me anything he knew. He couldn't afford to race, but we would go to the drag races to watch as far back as I can remember. (Anybody remember watching Dickey Harrell race?) In High School I had, still do as a matter of fact, a friend who's dad was an old drag racer and owns a transmission shop. Another close friend who also worked for him is now my brother-in-law. I hung around there a lot and picked up how to rebuild trannys and hot rod motors. I have built quite a few TH350/400's and some C4/C6's but haven't had the ability to do any ECM/TCM related work until now, mainly because I didn't have the diagnostic tools necessary to do them properly. At least until last weeks delivery from EFILive and the FedEx "Bird of Happiness". :cheers:

Now for my question--
Anybody ever run into this problem before? After 265,000 miles I finally had to shutdown and rebuild the transmission in my 1999 Silverado 4WD 5.3L LM7 4L60E. In the process of disconnecting all the sensor plugs on the txfr case/trans everything is going fine until I get to the shifter position sensor plugs. When I finally got them disconnected, the position sensor is in pieces and I am even having to pull some of the pins out of the plugs with a pair of pliers. :wtf1:
While inspecting the plugs they both looked like they had a layer of some sort of clear "adhesive" on them that basically glued them into the sockets. Other than the foreign substance in the plugs they looked fine. The "glue" seems to be too hard to be silicone. Did GM use any sealing compounds on these, other than the little molded 3 lip red silicone seal on the plugs, that maybe dried out somehow and acted like glue? The truck had 21k miles on it when I bought it in 2001 so anything could have happened to it between the factory and when I got it. Just curious.
I have a new position sensor coming for it for when I get back home next week to finish stacking clutches and getting things back together. After that I will likely have some more questions about getting my FlashScan unit going.
Thanks

joecar
January 22nd, 2010, 07:12 AM
Hi MHB, welcome to the forum...:cheers:

The clear glue stuff you see may be the connector insulation having melted at some time... unless someone applied glue... do you have pics...?

---

Yah, the C4 is fairly straight-forward...:cheers:

mhburton
January 22nd, 2010, 09:38 AM
Hi Joe, Thanks for the welcome.
I don't at the moment. I am out of town at work, but will post some when I get back home. I am waiting to go to work this evening & just got my Scan/Tune software loaded on my laptop & talking to the FlashScan Module while watching Barrett-Jackson.
I'll get some good closeups of the connectors and post them when I get back home.

doubledip
January 23rd, 2010, 12:31 AM
its a very common problem to have the inhibitor plugs stuck in (glued) ... even in the land of OZ :)

we tell our customers the easiest way is to just remove the whole inhibitor off the side of the box .. this way you dont destroy anything...


bit late now for you... but may save others the heartache of repairing/replacing both plug and switch

ChipsByAl
January 23rd, 2010, 03:10 AM
If you need to remove the connectors it is best done after they have been warmed up with a heat gun. They will be quite hot and you may need gloves to prevent burns. Heat them up again to reinsert the connectors.
Al

joecar
January 23rd, 2010, 10:58 AM
Oh, do you mean the manual position pressure switch block (on the bottom of the valve body) or the park/neutral starter inhibitor (on the side of the case)...?

joecar
January 23rd, 2010, 11:00 AM
So it is glue and it is melted on... I have often wondered about this.

Chuck CoW
January 23rd, 2010, 12:22 PM
Doesn't that suck!?!?!

After breaking a few of them years back, we now either remove the entire switch and hang it on the side, or....

USE A HEAT GUN TO WARM UP THE GOO and it COMES RIGHT OFF!

Chuck CoW

mhburton
January 24th, 2010, 11:23 AM
Cool, Thanks for the info. I found a new one coming for $29 & change, so it wasn't one of those real expensive screw-ups, but it will be one I won't forget. I never even thought about using a heat gun on it. Thanks for the tip Al & Chuck, that was a good one.
I glad GM didn't feel the need to do ALL of them. Seems like overkill to me considering how well Delphi designed the seals for these things. I'll send photos, none the less, just for the completeness of this thread info.


Y'all have a great resource here guys! You should be proud of what you have collectively created.:grd: I know this Texan has gotten MUCH valuable info from it.

joecar
January 24th, 2010, 11:24 AM
Thanks for the kind words...:cheers:...the members are what makes this forum...:cheers:

JezzaB
January 24th, 2010, 08:55 PM
USE A HEAT GUN TO WARM UP THE GOO and it COMES RIGHT OFF!

Chuck CoW

Sure does. And you can spray a little bit of WD40 or the likes to lube it up so its easier to remove next time.

Jez

vortecyota
January 27th, 2010, 10:27 AM
The clear goo is a strange form of di-electric grease that hardens when cool. i have r&red and built 500+ 4l60es and i use a heat gun coming off and back on every time. On my personal build i used the late mlp switch and connector . No goo. I think they were used from 04 on. good luck.