My buddy just bough an 1988 5.0 Automatic and it's got a shift kit. When the car is warmed up and he checks the fluid it's about an inch over the crosshatches on the dipstick. He says that his problem is, is that his car isn't shifting right, like it's not shifting at all out of first and second. Is the too much tranny fluid the problem? And yes I know it's not good at ALL to be running that high on fluid.

 

It will not help a bad trans by overfilling it, in fact it will cause the fliud to foam and cause more damage. So the foaming could be causing it shift bad, but it is unlikley as it is only and inch high. He is checking the level in neutral right?

 

Is the engine running when he checkes it?

Stupid question but had to ask! An inch high when it's not running translates to really low when running.

 

The Chilton manual says to run the car through all the gears put it in park with it still running and check it. And like i said the fluid is way over the full line maybe an inch and a half, but he says that at the most it will only shift into second. The only way it will shift is if he keeps a constant rpm for like 10 seconds.

 

Just making sure it was checked while running. Being an inch over the full make means different things depending on whether or not it was running when checked.

If ther wasn't a lot of foam on the dipstick when it was warmed up, the overfill should be a problem.

Past that, maybe a transmission guy will have some suggestions.

 

But yes, when he checked it the car was running and in park, we didn't see any foam on it when we checked it, but hopefully his shift kit ain't screwed up or is that just the way that they are?

 

Just take the 20 minutes to drain it, and change the filter. You can make sure the fluid is correct at that point too! If the filter is clogged you will get the same symtoms. If that doesn't do it you know you are looking at a much larger problem.

 

That's the thing, he did all of that when he did his shift kit. We're going to take some oil out tomorrow.

 

Is'nt there a vacume line running to the trans? Check that maybe the vacume line is cracked or pinched. Make sure to check all the little BS stuff, hopefully it's somthing simple.

 

just put a syfon tube down the stick and pull out about a quart