Transmission Question

74stang2togo said:

Whatever the hell you do, DO NOT BUY FROM MONSTER.

Below are the excerpts from my Mustang's build/progress thread pertaining to the 4L60E I bought from them for my dad's Suburban:

Spent all day Saturday on my back under my dad's Suburban wrestling out the "original" 4L60E that took a on him while pulling a trailer back on January 26th. I say "original" because we discovered during the removal process that we weren't the first ones in there (sloppy/lazy GM techs leave all sorts of clues, like a missing bellhousing bolt, and none of the electrical connector retainers put back through), and that the transmission and torque converter we took out were built 14 months after the truck itself (meaning it had a failure under warranty with it's original owner). Doesn't really matter, my dad bought the thing back in the mid 2000s and has put at least 120k miles of the 166k miles the truck has on it, so he got his money's worth from the original trans (for a piece of 4L60E anyway). All sorts of glitter in the fluid from the old one, and debris in the torque converter. The new Monster trans and Thor converter were filled and fired last night, we'll be going on a test drive with the 4Runner as the chase vehice at sunrise.

Another weekend of zero progress on the II.
It rained Saturday, so I did the subwoofer replacement in the 'yota. Sounds awesome, but I forgot to take pics.
I mentioned the Monster install in pop's Suburban in my last post. It's going back to them after 110 miles of use.
Long story short, Monster, and their warranty is bull.


Okay, full details on the Suburban's transmission:
We installed the thing on March 12, as I posted before. Did everything by the book, hell, I even torqued the bellhousing bolts to spec. Flushed the cooler and lines, upgraded to the Derale cooler in place of the factory auxilliary cooler as recommended by Monster Transmission, fresh case of Dexron VI fluid, whole nine yards.
We test drove it on March 13 a total of 15 miles or so with me following in the 4Runner. No smoke, leaks, drips, slippage, or any other issues. Checked the fluid at three different stops along the way and let it sit and idle for awhile before checking it one last time, fluid level was perfect.
My dad went to go to a meeting in Waco with it, and didn't make it the 45 miles to the meeting before the "trans fluid hot" warning showed up on his dash. He let it cool off in a parking lot for awhile, then gently drove it back home. The "trans fluid hot" message didn't return, but the check engine light came on. I brought my scanner home from work the next morning and pulled a P1870 (transmission slippage) code.
We called Monster, and they wouldn't even talk warranty because they hadn't received our core yet. We wait for a week for the core to get there, down a vehicle yet again, and then they finally contact us back. Their "3-year handshake WOWanty" is as follows:
Monster Transmission and Performance will pay $50 hr labor and will supply the necessary parts needed for the repair at no cost to you or the client if needed.
If you have access to the parts needed, Monster Transmission & Performance may, at our option, permit you to use comparable parts from your inventory. Please submit the part, as well as the price of the part(s) for review/approval.
Please send an estimate via email for repair prior to performing any work to the unit. As previously stated, we do not pay the following:

• Diagnostics
• Hazardous Waste removal
• Removal & Installation
• Shop fees
• Storage

If I'd read that particular bit of fine print before ordering, I would've ordered from somewhere else, but they make sure that's buried hell-and-gone on their website, and not anywhere near where you're looking at their transmissions.
We take it to a transmission shop I've done business with before, pay out-of-pocket for diag, and their diag is that the transmission is fried due to improper assembly, that it's slipping in 2nd and 4th and isn't locking up the converter. Their only recommendation is replacement or rebuild.
So we call Monster, and they want US to pay round-trip freight on a defective unit THEY shipped us. My dad gets them to agree to pay half (if I'd been on the phone instead that wouldn't have happened, they would've been paying all), so I spent yesterday afternoon yanking their junk rebuild out of the Suburban.

So, a few pages back, I chronicled the two transmission swaps in my dad's Suburban thanks to Monster Transmission's incompetance.
That particular saga continues.
You see, after I finished the second transmission R&R, my dad pretty much drove the Suburban exclusively for awhile. Well, he parked it for a few days and drove his Hyundai to save gas, and the Suburban leaked about a quart of transmission fluid all over the driveway from the tailhousing seal.
I figured they'd used the cheapest seal they could find, and replaced it with a new National seal, not bothering with their bull warranty over a $10 part and 30 minutes' work.
Dad drove the Suburban daily for awhile, all was well, and then he parked it for a few days, and it again "marked its territory".
I pull the driveshaft, measure the yoke with a micrometer, find that it's okay, and change the seal again, warning my dad that the next time it happens, we're going to have to take the tailhousing off the transmission and do some investigating.
Yesterday was that day, and what I found has me furious.
Monster didn't replace the tailhousing bushing, a goddamned wear item, while they had this thing apart! It's worn completely the hell out.
Whatever you do, don't buy a transmission from these assclowns.

No vibrations, just the recurring leak. Also found out it's missing a sleeve that's supposed to be on the tailshaft in this particular application that reduces fluid flow to the driveshaft yoke. Monster Transmissions is a ing joke.

EFFIN' SHORT VERSION: I'm an ASE-certified technician that works on cars for a living. Dropping a 4L60E out of a Chevy and putting the new one in is child's play for me (hell, I work on BMW for a living, EVERYTHING ELSE is child's play at this point). Installed the first transmission by-the-book, THEIR book, in fact, as they wanted certain things done a specific way "for warranty purposes". The first transmission that they shipped to us failed spectacularly after just over 100 miles, and their warranty replacement had multiple problems until I finally took it apart and found that they'd forgotten a part, re-used a worn-out wear item, and installed an incorrect seal and rectified their errors.

After the fact, I found pages upon pages of complaints about them on the various GM forums... which I wish I'd read first.

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