The wagon lives! Sortof.
Well, I finally tracked down the reason the ABS light was activated in the wagon. Apparently, battery voltage is one of the tests performed by the Bosch system used in the ’95 Caprice and friends. Thanks, awesome website! Anyway, my leaky air shocks were running the battery down and causing the low condition, even though the cool gear-reduction starter GM used on the LT1 (which, as long as you have the bigger flexplate/flywheel, you can also use on a Gen 1 smallblock or any of the big blocks, BTW) was cranking it over just fine. So, the Battery Tender took care of that.
But I still have a problem with the transmission, and a power steering leak. The steering leak is easy enough; I just have to replace the lines. I’m gonna go ahead and put in the cooler return line used in the cop cars, since it has the extra loop of line which works as a steering cooler, and only costs a few bucks more.
The transmission is weird, though. I blew the pump up a year or so ago, and just fixed it recently. Now it runs, but what’s happening is that the computer tells the transmission to enter second, the transmission says “hey, I’m in second” – but it stays in first. And since the shiftpoints are controlled by the road speed (which is annoying when you change tire sizes / gears / etc), you have to continue accelerating to the speed where it would normally do the 2-3 shift – except that you’re actually still in first. So, the engine’s screaming,but the computer thinks all is fine because you’re supposedly in second. Once it shift to third, the 3-4 shift happens as normal.
Now, I’m trying to figure out what’s going on. I’m a tad concerned that I’ll have to pull the transmission back out an rebuild it. But I don’t want to take it back out. I’m considering just changing the shiftpoints to just skip second gear. The thing makes enough torque that, with the better rear gears, I could drive it that way – or probably sell it to someone a little less mechanical. But that’d be mean, and I’d probably feel bad. :) So, it’ll get fixed. Anyone with thoughts on how to do so is welcome to contact me. ;)
