So start with the problem first...
Today I was giving some "joy rides" to my cousins in the van, winding it out in 1st and 2nd and went on 5 of these joy rides without issue, until the last one. Seemed like she didn't want to come out of 1st and revved over a little bit to around 6500 rpm (usually shift around 6000-6100) before I got it into 2nd. Only thing that was different on this run than the previous 4 runs. Well when I get back close to their house, I hear a metallic scraping kind of clanking coming from the van, maybe rear, maybe trans. Upon arrival at their house, I have no reverse (yep, trans). Also at low speed/low throttle position the trans makes a lot of noise in what I guess is 2nd gear but it feels like I don't have a 1st gear now... Just a 2nd gear which I have to rev a bit more and it "slowly" takes off, but of course I'm not trying to kill it given I think there is trouble with the trans, but when she's finally in 3rd gear, driving down the freeway, she seems normal. I drove it from Washington near seattle back down to oregon, 180+ miles today after having this problem, and she did great the whole way except for the problems described. I plan to put her up on a lift and pop the trans pan and see what's up, but if I need to rebuild her for sure, if someone knows where I should look, any help in this would be appreciate as I plan to hit a race this coming weekend!!!
So update, the paint job is finally done, i finally fixed most of the other little bugs with the fuel system and the nitrous system is working well still. I gutted the interior to drop 300 lbs of weight (now 3850 empty) and went shooting for 11's last weekend (July 21/22) at Woodburn Drag Strip in Oregon. Results are:
Saturday first pass: 11.98 @ 112.9, 12.0's to 12.10 the rest of the day, mid 12.0's most of the time. Ran a 12.073 on a 12.07 dial once too, lifting right before the line!!
Yeah, I ended up with first place on the first race I put the van in since she got shut down for paint over 2 years ago. I was just "on" I guess!!!
Missed racing her.
Sunday at the Mopar Nationals annual race at WOodburn: 1st time trial (i left the van at the track over night with some friends and got some fresh nitrous and 114 race fuel to top the tank up a bit), I ran 11.949 @ 113.33 mph. Had a nice long cool down after that pass due to a broken diesel or something, and ran 11.95 @ 113.83. After that with less cool down was running 12.0's again (12.028) but red lit in first round (staged a little too deep I guess
) and then ran out of nitrous on my first pass in the runner up category and went 12.70 @ 106 ... guess I really can only go 4 passes on a bottle safely! lol Here are some pictures and links to videos of the runs!
Peace out and appreciate any help on the transmission issue!!!
-TheOtherVan aka Alikazam
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4bDeIheyGs&feature=plcphttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4bDeIheyGs&feature=plcphttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBAgFVzh4RY&feature=plcp
