I dropped the 80-e off yesterday morning at a well-respected transmission shop here in town, and they're trying to tell me that they have to take the transmission apart to do the shift kit? Should I listen to them or pick the tranny up and tell them where to go?

 

Go get it. It should be the same as the HD for the 60, as far as instalation goes.

 

Depends on what they mean by "take apart". You can do a trans-go on vehicle without pulling the trans. You do have to drop the pan for access but you don't need to disassemble. So if he's saying take apart means remove the pan and a couple other items then he is correct. If he means take apart as in break it down, I would go get it quickly.

 

you have to take the pan, and valve body off to put a shift kit in and everything in between. you could do it yourself in a couple hours. i did mine and i had never tore into one before till i did mine and its got around 30k on it now.
also i got a guy here at the place you came last week that can do it for you for a good price but i dont know if you want to drive that far.

 

The pump has to come out on a 80E to replace the pressure regulator spring, but I am not for sure if the 80E requires the spring to be replaced. I know the pressure regulator on a 60E is located on the valve body. You might want to call Transgo and ask them what all needs to be replaced on the 80E.

 

Well, I picked the tranny up but they had already installed the kit by the time I could get over there to pick it up. They didn't install my hardened separator plate like I asked. They thought that I wanted the entire kit installed, which would require them to break open the tranny (not the valve body) and add some different springs to the drums or something like that. I called Transgo and they said that it's not absolutely necessary to do that, just good to have if the tranny is apart.

The also didn't pull the pump to enlarge the converter feed (I think that's what the guy at Transgo said) and I might have my dad or someone do that for me real quick before we put it in.

Anyway, thanks for the advice guys. I really really really hope this thing is done right. Otherwise, someone will have to see their proctologist about removing a transmission from their rectum, if you know what I mean.

 

there are two kits. HD2 reprogramming kit requires tranny drop for complete installation. home install kit w/ video only requires drop of pan...i think...at least thats how it is for 4l60e