Story time about my Ram and a transmission shop. (Long Read)

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Update:

Remember how I said they claimed my rear axle was the problem? I have a nasty whine coming from somewhere, and a bad vibration. I took it to the mechanic I've been going to for the past couple years, we put the truck up on the lift and inspected everything. We put the truck up on a jack and spun the wheels up to 40mph.

That whining noise is coming from the rear diff.

The guys at the transmission shop replaced my speed sensor because it was trashed. They also replaced the diff fluid. I asked the guy at the transmission shop what exactly he used, he said 75w-90. I asked him if he used a fluid with friction modifier or anything like that, he said no, just straight 75w-90.

So basically, my LSD rear axle is pretty much toast. My axle was perfectly fine before he replaced the diff fluid, the fact that he didn't use a fluid for LSD differentials tells me that the clutch pack inside the diff is now fucked.

I'm now looking at a rear axle rebuild. I have to sell my YJ now.
 
I'm going to try that route, problem is I can't really take these guys to court because there's no documentation of anything after the first rebuild.

They told me that there's no invoice for the second rebuild because of it being under warranty. They don't do invoices because of that. So I have no idea what they actually did other than what they claim.

There's no documentation of them ever touching my rear diff, in court they could claim I did all that and I'm trying to say they did it.

Every single time I've brought my truck into that shop, it's come out worse. At this point, I'm ready to just cut my losses and accept the fact that I got hosed and hung out to dry, and find somebody else to undo all the damage that's been done to my truck.

With finances now depleted, no energy to do anything, and 2 months down the drain, I've got nothing left.

EDIT: Like seriously, all the money I had saved for a rainy day is now gone, and now I have no truck. If my YJ goes down, I'm screwed.
 
I'm surprised they didn't know it was limited slip, I think all dodge ram rear ends are. Good thing it's only a 200 dollar axle at the junk yard and easy to swap.
 
Take your cover off and clean it and if it looks good put the proper fluid in and run it. Might clear up, they are strong axles
 
Not all of them are, but it's pretty easy to find out. I think I might try that, along with replacing the u joints. If that fixes it, I'll be stoked.
 
So I called around and ended up calling a diff shop that the people at Allstate Transmissions (the shop that did my transmission and transfer case inspection) referred me too.

So a full rebuild with a crush sleeve terminator kit will be $850.

I'm currently withholding the name of the shop that's been a pain in the ass to deal with.
 
Ok, well, update. That axle rebuild ended up being $1100 after taxes. My dumbass said 4.88 over the phone when going over what I wanted.

I ended up not regretting that decision. 4.88s and 33s is a blast to drive in the city with a 5.9. Just keep it below 72mph on the highway and your fuel mileage is a-ok. I actually gained mileage on the highway, probably because I also went from 75-80mph on the highway, to 65-70... but we'll pretend it was the gears.

So yeah, other than my transmission not being squared away, all fine and dandy until...

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T boned by a guy in a rental van. The truck is a total loss. I was making a left turn at a green arrow when this guy blew the red light and slammed into me so hard that I swung around and slammed into a concrete barrier on the corner, and then bounced off that and swung back around again.

The accident happened a few months ago. I already got my property claim check which I've used to rebuild my other truck and the WJ. Still waiting on the personal injury claim for both my lady and I.
 
Good morning JF.

Sorry to hear SDJ, glad that both of you are ok.

Thank you.

The chiropractor is doing a fantastic job of fixing us up. My girlfriend is starting to not have headaches anymore. My back is feeling a lot better, my treatment is almost over.

Overall, I'm ready to close out this bullshit story and move on. Thanks to the asshole that t boned me, I've made a lot of progress on some areas, and gone backwards in other areas that were high priority before all this happened.
 
I hope you have a bettet lawyer than mine. It's been three years and he wants me to settle for half of what I have out of pocket.
 
For anyone considering legalshield, save your money. I'm subscribed to their service and they pretty much told me there's fuckall they can do for me. So I ended up hiring an attorney that handles accidents and personal injury claims.

Right now I'm waiting on the delivery driver to do his job and get here to my house with my new engine. I have to tear it down and do a partial rebuild on it. It's got 109,000 miles on it, but it still needs the Hughes plenum fix, and all the accessories along with a tune up. Should be a solid, reliable engine for my black Ram once it goes in.

Since funds have gotten low, I'm gonna have to wait until tax season to rebuild my tranny. Thankfully the 46RE isn't incredibly complicated, pretty easy to rebuild. Although I wish there was a good 5 or 6 speed automatic out there I could swap into my truck.
 
I like to do the work on my own vehicles so crap like this doesn't happen.

That said if it was my truck I would first try draining and refilling the diff and drive it a day or 2....then drain and refill it again and see if that solves it.
You may get lucky.

Hope it all works out as wow what a nightmarish shit show its been.
 
I like to do the work on my own vehicles so crap like this doesn't happen.

That said if it was my truck I would first try draining and refilling the diff and drive it a day or 2....then drain and refill it again and see if that solves it.
You may get lucky.

Hope it all works out as wow what a nightmarish shit show its been.

Part of my property claim check went to buying tools. I already had the basics that every diy guy should have, hand tools, jack, stands, various other little tools like light testers and stuff.

I recently bought an Ingersoll W7150 electric impact that has 1100ft-lbs of torque, a 20 ton shop press, ball joint kit with expansion set, angle grinder, in-lb and ft-lb torque wrenches, and a whole bunch of other shit.

I'm on a mission at this point of get every tool imaginable so I no longer have to send my stuff anywhere.

I also had to go out and buy new wheels thanks to the "mechanic" that I used to use. The black Ram is sitting at his shop since I don't have a place to store it. The aluminum 17x8 off road edition wheels on a 2nd gen Ram don't fit 2WD models on the front. The hub is different, so you need hubcentric wheel spacers to fit them properly. I decided to just seat them on decently until I can get wheel spacers, and then the mechanic ran those bitches on with an impact all the way down and cracked a couple wheels.

So, I bought 3rd gen Ram 17x8 road wheels that are chrome clad, and painted them black. I still need the chrome center caps.
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In the meantime, while the spacers and wheels sit in my room, the engine is being torn down for inspection of the heads and the bottom end. Last thing I need is to get the new engine in and find out it doesn't actually have 109,000 miles and has a fucked camshaft and bearings, or piston rings that won't seal. I also installed the Hughes plenum plate that solves the blown plenum gasket issues on Magnum engines.
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And I decided to install new headlight and foglight housings with LEDs since the old aftermarket housings and halogens that came with the truck were total junk.
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HUGE difference in light output and clarity. Far surpasses the dual bulb 99-01 sport housings I had in the white truck.
 
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Since I have to be up in about an hour and a half, and can't sleep, I might as well post something.

So I took the heads off the other day and cleaned all the carbon off, which there was a lot of. The cylinders still have cross hatching, the heads aren't visibly cracked, and the pistons look perfectly fine. I probably should have done a compression check before I tore everything apart, but since I still don't have a compression gauge, fuck it... I'll just do it later and hope for the best.

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Both the pistons and the heads had a thick ass layer of carbon buildup that was thicker than what you can see in the pictures. I swear to god it had to be enough to bump up the compression ratio.
 
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A few random things to post on a Friday night.

I strongly recommend the Ingersoll W7150 electric impact if you can afford to drop between $300-400 on a tool. It'll change your life, strong enough to over torque the lug nuts on a semi. It'll quite literally impact the shit out of any bolt on your Jeep and remove it.
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I decided to put some decals on the back window of my truck while it waits to be revived.
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And what I'm daily driving for the time being.
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