Good transmission shop in Denver area?

[Martinjmpr]

y'all are getting me nervous now. Been talking with my astronomy-pal neighbor about my hauling his Fleetwood Evolution E2 pop-up camper trailer on some mountain and desert astronomy trips. 4400-lbs. Might be the death knell. Might make some trans cooling improvements before I do so.

Looks just like this:

Martin, have you been using the Tow/Haul mode switch during this towing, or just manually downshifting on grades?

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I use tow/haul whenever the trailer is hooked up - as long as I remember to push the button. If you shut the engine off and turn it back on it drops out of tow/haul. A couple of times we've been on a trip and stopped to eat or use the rest area and then started up again and we'll drive for 40 - 50 miles before I think "dang, I forgot to push the tow/haul button!
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And yes now that my instrument cluster is fixed and I can see what gear I'm in, I manually shift when ascending a steep grade.
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At least the good news was that the 3/4 failure did not leave me stranded. I had to drive home at 45 mph in 2nd gear, sweating bullets and hoping the transmission wouldn't give out, but I made it. And impressively, I made it from Kremmling, CO to Englewood (about 110 miles) which meant that I had to go from about 7,000' elevation up to 11,000' and then back down to 5500'. Actually, except for not being able to go fast, it was fine.

 

[justcuz]

Damn, sorry to hear that martin, especially right before a trip!

Looks like you found a place and you have a time crunch, but in my opinion, find the place your local utilities use for their 1500's. There is always a shop/ guy in every part of the country, that solely builds 4l60E/4l80E's all day, everyday for big fleets. Usually they'll be cheaper than your everyday transmission shop, and they, in my experience are usually better. They also will know exactly what parts to upgrade, and what not to. 4l60E's are common enough that most shops see a lot of them, but I have piece of mind that the guy building mine, literally only does these 4l60e's. I had even bought the rebuild kit, (thinking I may want to tackle it myself- have done a simple two speed before). He wouldn't take my rebuild kit (thank god for amazon returns), and told me to go buy these certain pieced together parts, that's the type of knowledge you get from only building these everyday.

Hopefully this next one lasts a long time- definitely do the upgraded parts! I'm looking at doing the 4l80e swap in the next year or so, the 4l60E is defitely a weak point, but at least they never seem to strand you. (I've had two go out- one under warranty at 30k miles, I think the dealer underfilled the fluid, and another more recently at almost 200k, both started at the 3-4 shift).

I am seriously considering trying a rebuild myself since I have an extra trans laying around. I know a shift kit, sun gear shell and Corvette servo are some good mods and have heard about some red friction packs. Do you happen to still have that parts list available?

 

[plainjaneFJC]

Decided to go with High Country since they were closer (they also have a shop at Alameda and I-25.)
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Got the bad news this morning: Need a full rebuild at around $2k. Honestly, it's about what I expected. I talked to the guy at the shop today and he said they do rebuild with stronger parts so at the end I should have a reasonably stout transmission that will likely last the next 3 years or so.
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What sucks is that I just got all the parts I needed for the lift and my plan was to have that done prior to 9/3 when we take off for Yellowstone. Now with the truck not being done until Friday or Monday, that's out of the question.
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Ah, well, when I bought a 12 year old truck with 136,000 miles on it I knew I was taking this kind of a gamble, so I really can't complain. Otherwise the truck has been great, very comfy and a great tow vehicle.

2 grand is reasonable Imo. I've always went for a factory reman because the warranty is good on them. I think I pay around 2700 bucks installed.