Transmission jack confusion

Well, the drivetrain noise on the C5Z has gotten worse lately, so I'm going to need to try to figure out exactly what is causing it. But like it or not, one way or another, I'm sure the drivetrain is going to have to come out. So I'm steeling myself for that chore by reading up on what I'm going to be facing and what tools I will need.

I'm sure I'm going to be needing at least one transmission jack, so I've been carefully looking over all the units available to try to figure out which one (or two) will be best for me to work with. But the problem is that I am missing something very basic about these things. The issue is with the head or platform that the transmission (and/or differential) actually rests upon.



I believe having the capability of tilting the platform will be beneficial, especially when trying to line up the shafts to re-install the components (trans, dif, and torque tube), but apparently most platforms I see only have the capability of tilting in one direction. In the pic above the tilt screw will tilt the platform up or down in the left or right direction. This particular platform may have another adjustment, but ordinarily it is to just move the platform laterally in the opposite direction, but does not effect any sort of tilting.

But I'm just not getting it. Those brackets on the sides of the platform look like they would be a problem in that the edges would contact the underside of the transmission. Meaning the transmission will sit on the edges of those brackets. I feel like the transmission should actually be positioned front to back in the pic above so it will rest FLAT on the platform. But if I do that, then the tilting adjustment will not tilt the transmission the way it would be needed to try to get the shaft aligned properly.

So what am I missing here? Yes, there are some transmission jacks that come with platforms that do tilt in both dimensions, but there are so many with just a single adjustment that I feel like I just have to be missing something basic with the way these things are supposed to be used.

Anyone have experience using a transmission jack that can help straighten me out with this?

i've always used the dual tilt jacks. the brackets on the side are used to sit on the pan where the bolts go in for support to keep it from shifting around. the c5 trans pan has a round center on the pan.

you can see it here

Actually, I've got a manual tranny in mine...



Plus I have that brace on transmission as well.

So trying to fit a transmission jack platform in there is going to take some figuring out.

Man, I've been looking over the pics I've taken during the period I was working on all this stuff, and honestly I felt a wave of nausea thinking about doing this..... Getting too old to be doing this sort of crap. Maybe I would feel a little better if I actually knew what it is I need to fix or replace.

Of course, I've been looking at videos and pics of guys doing this stuff in their driveway laying on their backs and they seem to have been able to do it OK. Just a touch of "wimplash", I guess.

Thanks for the pics.

I can't comment on which trans jack to use, but your comment about guys on YouTube doing it in a driveway reminded me of the time when I was 17 and removed and later reinstalled the trans from my '61 Vette in my parents' driveway. Of course that was much simpler a task, and I'm not comparing what I did to the complexities of what's ahead of you. It just brought back some memories of when the necessity to think and re-think things wasn't in the picture. Good luck with your job.

Well, heck, I pulled the car out of one bay in the garage and pulled it into the bay with the lift, and the drivetrain didn't make even a peep. Go figure...... :banghead:

I pull them out on 6,6 ton Jack Stands, and 3, 2 1/2 ton floor jacks by myself when I need too. Takes me about 2 1/2 hrs. If I had a lift I could probly shave 30 minutes off that!

The job looks intimidating Rich,But it ain't that bad!!~!:thumbsup:

What kind of noise are you having and when,I'm purdy proficient on standard transmissions,Don't matter if its a Corvette,Mustang,4x4 Truck or John Deer!

Yeah, probably so, Junk, but the first time doing anything always gets me apprehensive. Fear of the unknown, I guess. But yeah, apparently lots of people can do this job laying on their back in their driveway, so my having a lift SHOULD make this much easier to do. Still, there is this old age thing, and my back certainly isn't what it used to be. The other day I did a tire rotation on the Jeep, and putting the rotated tire back on that rear spare tire carrier about did my back in. So if I have to buy a couple of transmission jacks to save my back, that is what I will have to do.

I was looking underneath the car yesterday, kind of hoping it would prove to be a transmission problem and hoping I could pull the differential and tranny without having to lower the torque tube below where the edge of the tunnel plate is. I've heard some people say that you need to remove the intake manifold to keep it from hitting against the firewall when the angle of the torque tube gets acute enough to be able to pull it away from the bellhousing.

Anyway, here's a video showing the noise I am talking about:



This was after I had the torque tube, clutch, throwout and pilot bearings, and flywheel replaced. The noise seems to happen most often going from a dead stop and when I am taking pressure off of the clutch pedal so that the clutch pressure plate engages the disk. It will sometimes, although more rarely and less noticeably, happen when changing gears while accelerating. Happens in reverse as well as forward gears. I can often feel a strong vibration associated with the noise directly on the shifter handle.

I believe this has been happening all along ever since I brought the car home from Aaron Scott's place, but haven't checked back to confirm it. There were noises then likely caused by the over long Pfadt driveshaft and failing throw out bearing that could have been masking this current drivetrain noise. The transmission and differential were built by RPM, btw.

I'm hoping to be able to reproduce the noise reliably so I can try to pinpoint exactly what it going on. I bought one of those Steelman 97202 wireless transmitter kits that I'm hoping to use for that purpose.



It appears to me that the sound only happens under load, and intermittently. Transmission has to be in gear, clutch pedal is being let off of and as torque is applied to the drivetrain, the noise will *sometimes* show up.

So I sure would appreciate some ideas. I've been scouring YouTube looking for videos of anyone else having this same sort of problem, but with no luck so far. I sure as heck don't want to pull the drivetrain apart and then wind up just putting it back together again because I couldn't find any smoking gun. And I sure as heck just don't want to start replacing everything hoping that the shotgun approach will work, although expensively.

:shrug01:

How many miles do you have on the clutch and flywheel?
The reason I ask is when I replaced my clutch and flywheel to a GM LS7,My clutch would hiss and sometimes kinda groan or chatter on engagement for the first 1000-1200 miles,except in neutral.

gmjunkie said:

How many miles do you have on the clutch and flywheel?
The reason I ask is when I replaced my clutch and flywheel to a GM LS7,My clutch would hiss and sometimes kinda groan or chatter on engagement for the first 1000-1200 miles,except in neutral.

Click to expand...

The clutch was replaced back on August 02, 2012. Looking at the end of year figures for 2015 (that I can lay my hands on right at the moment), I've got at least 4700 miles on that clutch. I remember that I treated the clutch gingerly for the first 500 miles to break it in. That's not to say that the clutch can't be bad. Certainly would be par for the course with me.

The clutch is a Centerforce clutch, but I don't remember the model number off hand.

The date of that video of the squealing noise is in October of 2012, if I remember correctly, and the noise has been happening at least that long intermittently. Seemed to be getting worse a few months ago, so I hadn't been driving the car for around 6 months or so. I was actually surprised when I pulled it out of the garage bay to put it into the lift bay that it made no noise whatsoever.

FYI, I never really was hard on that clutch. Never done any burnouts, and power shifts, so the clutch has been pretty much just babied all this time. "Granny shifting" is probably a pretty accurate term to use.

Anything that I should look for or try to test to try to narrow down the possibilities?

Thanks for your help.

Well, looks like two other shops agree with your assessment, Junk. I contacted RPM Transmissions as well as Greg at AntiVenom, sending a link to that above video and both said that it was the clutch. Some aftermarket clutches are just noisy and I guess my Centerforce one fits in that category. Maybe the material on the disk is just harder than normal.

So it looks like it's just going to be something I need to live with until I actually need to replace the clutch and then simply try a different brand at that time. Kind of embarrassing to have it make that screeching noise, though, but embarrassment is really not enough to force me to buy a transmission jack and go through a drivetrain extraction and re-install. :ack2:

You know, I had actually had the thought a while back that I was getting sand in the clutch from just driving down the sandy road leading to and through my property. Lord knows I have brake rotors scored from sand getting between the rotors and the brake pads. It just SOUNDED like a clutch issue to me, but after all this time, I thought it just couldn't BE the clutch. So live and learn, I guess.

Guess I need to get out and drive that car now.

It still my quit making the noise,If you've been babying it, it may not of seated in completely yet!:thumbsup: