Huy Tran
Full Access Member
Didn't mean to scare you away from using your truck for it's intended purpose. These are absolutely beautiful and capable trucks. That being said, the transmission does have some problems. But they don't appear as prevalent in the LRs.
The first time I got the error, about 6 months ago, the dealership wanted to just replace the whole thing for about $11,000 as they don't service the internals.
Since then, I've been on some 2k+ mile road trips and some trail runs without any issues.
The last two times this happened, the lattest being last week, it was after the truck had been in what I would call "extreme" conditions. Stop and go traffic for over an hour with the gears constantly changing up and down. I knew I was going to have problem and was expecting it. Sure enough the truck started hesitating and lurching between shifts. Then would throw warning lights, pop out of fourth and the engine would rev higher. Would do that every time I slowed down and speed up again. After I was able to pull over and shut down for about 10 minutes, it started up fine and was able to drive normally for another 15 miles home.
I would consider towing and trailering to be as demanding on the tranny. That's why I installed a remote transmission cooler on my 3/4 ton Silverado.
I consider myself a fair shadetree mechanic and would love to gut and rebuild one of these ZF 6HP, but just don't have the time. Too many other projects...
So will drop it off to an independent mechanic for a rebuild next week.
I'm sure I can get more miles out of it if I keep an eye on it, but I just want peace of mind knowing that it'll be ready for anything.
The first time I got the error, about 6 months ago, the dealership wanted to just replace the whole thing for about $11,000 as they don't service the internals.
Since then, I've been on some 2k+ mile road trips and some trail runs without any issues.
The last two times this happened, the lattest being last week, it was after the truck had been in what I would call "extreme" conditions. Stop and go traffic for over an hour with the gears constantly changing up and down. I knew I was going to have problem and was expecting it. Sure enough the truck started hesitating and lurching between shifts. Then would throw warning lights, pop out of fourth and the engine would rev higher. Would do that every time I slowed down and speed up again. After I was able to pull over and shut down for about 10 minutes, it started up fine and was able to drive normally for another 15 miles home.
I would consider towing and trailering to be as demanding on the tranny. That's why I installed a remote transmission cooler on my 3/4 ton Silverado.
I consider myself a fair shadetree mechanic and would love to gut and rebuild one of these ZF 6HP, but just don't have the time. Too many other projects...
So will drop it off to an independent mechanic for a rebuild next week.
I'm sure I can get more miles out of it if I keep an eye on it, but I just want peace of mind knowing that it'll be ready for anything.