I was looking into upgrading my stock tranny pan to the 3qt larger pan in order to keep my tranny a little cooler while towing. Is this a cost effective upgrade or a waste of money? I currently live in socal and tow a travel trailer which weighs about 6000lbs during the very hot months of the summer. I frequently travel through the Mojave desert and Arizona during these trips where the temp can reach 120 degrees. Any help would be appreciated.



:thankyou2

The pans have yet to gain solid proof that they will lower fluid temps. If that is the sole reason your thinking of doing it, then save your money. Mike L. is in the final stages of a replacement trans cooler that will be a drop in unit and so far in his testing provides a solid 20 degree temp drop.

:iamwithst
(:joke: Eric....all these smilies are just too fun:lol: )

I agreey with Eric. A nice thing about the deep pan you can get from Eric, gm or the allison dealer, ect. is it will take the peaks and vallys outa your temp IMO it wont fluctuate as quick, your suction filter will be submersed in more fluid so its less likely to suck air. I noticed no drop in temp though. It is pretty cheap though and its a good excuse to drop your pan and inspect things and change part of your fluid. It may not really help and or its effect may not be really noticable but its cheap insurance IMO.

If you want some cool man :bling: then you could get a magtech pan or the like

Edit: i have the deep allsion pan on mine. Got it from Eric. Came with a new sump filter. The gasket is reusable. Need some ATF too. Its an easy 3 beer project. One while opening the box of goodies and finding all your tools that are hiding(probably most time consuming part), one while draining the pan and the rest of the job and on victory brew. Just dont drink while refilling the trans.....too easy to get the bottle of bud and the bottle of ATF mixed up and ATF will really knock your dingy in the dirt:grd:

Thanks for the info fellas. DmaxalliTech is the trans cooler going to be available anytime soon? Im really close to getting my trans fluid changed and want to do the upgrades with the new tranny fluid at the same time. I just dont want to overheat in the desert far away from civilization. I would be willing to use the upgrade tranny pan with the trans cooler to play it safe. The pan isnt too much of an upgrade to include to do at the same time. Ive seen my temp get above 200 while driving in the mountains and it scared me a bit. Thanks again.

Your temps will still go above 200 towing even with the deep pan. I added the deep pan and switched to transynd about two years ago, before a trip to the Black Hills towing our 10k fiver in 100 degree heat. Have towed about 7000 miles with the deep pan and see the same high temps as I did with the OEM pan. It takes a little while longer to reach these temps, but then takes a while longer to cool back down, too. ALso, it takes even longer to warm the fluid at all in sub-zero temps in the winter. If running lower temps is your goal, I'd wait for Mike L's cooler. If you want the benefit of running more fluid for improved fluid life, then the deep pan is probably worth it.

Don

Hopefully Mike will have the cooler avail soon. Not sure of his timeframe with the project

More oil better the cooling. Later! Frank

I put my deeper pan on this weekend and was surprised at the amount of fluid still left inside the stock pan. If anything my deeper pan will allow me to get all of the fliud out of the pan. I don't know about running cooler. My pan has fins on it. :ro)

Rudy, what year truck do u have?
I thought the newer trucks came w/ the bigger pan.

Adding more oil will only increase the amount of time it take to get up to temp. And on the flip side, it will also increase the anoumt of time it takes to cool off. The best way to reduce temps, is to add more cooling surfaces..ie another cooler.

You know guys I have been working on hydraulic systems for near 40 years. This is the only place I ever heard said that adding more oil does nothing to improve cooling on a marginal system. Later! Frank

My temps havent changed a bit with different pans... Like BK said, more oil just takes longer to change temp.

I noticed no difference in overall temps. It takes longer to get there and longer to come back. It takes the quick higher peak out but steady use it runs the same from what I have seen

What you both just said is it helps. :exactly: Thank you very much. I am going to give you one example where what you just said will help those towing. Pulling long hills with my 5th wheel gradually increases the trans temp to around 200 in the summer months. A few miles down the other side it will drop 20 degrees or better. If three quarts more oil gives me another few miles that will be worth every penny.

I installed my deep pan this morning. All went well except for a little too much oil on the floor. The amount of oil I drained was pretty close to the figures steeltech got. I varied from his procedure a little. I used 3/4" heater hose this time instead of the 5/8" last time which just didn't want to stay on the line. The 3/4" will slide over the dimple on the line and stays put. Don't push it on more than necessary because you will need to cut the hose to get it off. I only lost 1". Both times I have changesd my oil I had oil come out of the trans port I removed the return line from. This ain't a big deal if you have the drain pan under it. Pull the filter down slowly to insure the oil above it will end up in the drain pan instead of on the floor. The quad ring on the filter stayed in the trans. It was easily removed with a little hook tool. My pan was exceptionally clean for 60K. I have posted a few photos for those interested. Later! Frank

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/fnsblum2004/album?.dir=/4e27