I made my move !!!!!
 

Well, I was moving to Montana, but found to little town out of the way of the madding crowd here in Florida. Damn if this place does not have hills and left AND right hand turns. Never thought a town existed like this in Florida, hills and turns !!!! I am a native Floridian, one of six, blew me away. Got the sticker stuff back up just fine and am doing well. Now that I am closer to Gainesville, I entered the Subaru Challenge on 22 October. Never done anything like that before, so thought what the hay. The shift kit I installed, I don't know. I am not so sure it was the best investment to make. The power light flashes and I have had no response fro the Small Car guys. Odd, the shifts are a bit firmer, especially the downshifts, mid-range, however there is something strange about the shift into 4th (5th). Yes, I said 5th. I can be driving around normally and feel the shifts, watching the tach to confirm. Even after the shift into 4th at say 60, knowing I am already into 4th, the tach reading about 2200, there is another 'shift up' and the tach reads the normal 2050 for 60. It's quite pronounced in the effect on the tach and you can feel a subtle shift. Not like a slip...just another shift. If I did not know better, I have a 5 speed automatic.

You remind me of myself.

The power light blinks because the TCU is confused, but it's OK.
The "5th gear" you are feeling is the torque converter locking.

I was in aviation for 20 years or so, so I notice EVERYTHING. The TCU being confused is not surprising...it would have been nice if they had responded to the numerous emails I sent. As for the convertor locking up, duh..I shoulda known that...that makes perfect sense, so it is a 5 speed automatic after all, technically.. Explains the 27.5 mpg on the highway....I swear, its true.

It might as well be 5 speeds. It's not like MTs have lockable TCs.

The shift kit is definitely not wired correctly. The shift kit senses engine load by measuring manifold vacuum. The torque converter doesn't lock up during heavy engine load, which is the only time the shift kit should be functioning. Downshifts should be under zero engine load, and thus the shift kit should be doing nothing. You should not feel a pronounced downshift during deceleration, ever. Because you are getting the flashing power light, this indicates the problem is being detected by the TCU and is related to the electrical wiring. It sounds like solenoid A has been disconnected, probably by unplugging the dropping resistor during the wiring process, and you have full shift pressure all the time. The shift kit should have included a resistor soldered to the relay. This resistor prevents the TCU from detecting the shift kit and sounding the alarm, so to speak. Even if the shift kit was mis-plumbed, or malfunctioning, the TCU shouldn't complain. The wires just aren't hooked up right. ...unless there's some other unrelated problem with the transmission that's upsetting the TCU.

You are right about the downshifting, but I brought up the power code a couple months ago and everyone agreed there was no real problem coming from the smallcar kit alone.

Hey fl_svx, do us a favor and count how many times it blinks. Is it 16?

How far do you have the kit adjusted?

It is 16 and I have made NO adjustments.

I'll try to address each concern or issue raised with a previous post.

1. With the car in stock configuration, there is no flashing power light. With the dropping resistor disconnected, a flashing power light-16. With the dropping resistor connected in series to the shift kit, a flashing power light-16.

2. The wiring for the shift kit is in series, one terminal connected to a single wire from the harness for the dropping resistor, one terminal to the other cut end which goes to the dropping resistor, dunno how I could screw that up.

3. With both dropping resistor and or shift kit disconnected, the tranny hunts on decelleration. With the shift kit connected, there is no hunting.

4. The firmer downshifts come from mashing my foot to the floorboard to accelerate, not decellerate, midrange accelleration is AWESOME !!!

5. The TC locks up noticeably when I do this, accellerate to 60 mph, hold it there and then wait a couple of seconds, the rpms drop 150-200 to the 2050 rpm for 60 mph. This is a no-load condition.

6. I have made no changes to the factory vacuum setting.

I would check the (two) conections you made when adding the kit.

I had the same issue with both my 95 and 96. When I put the kit inline the wires were pulling free of the conecters. They looked fine, but were not. There just is not enough extra wire. I used a pair of needle nose plyers on the crimps and that solved the problem on both cars. If I did it again I would solder the conection.

Yes, the connections are good...they would have to be or there would be hunting on decel....however I will czech again. I did crimp them and alleviated to short harness and too short vacuum set up as well.

Thx.

Here are pics of Chike's installation of the shift kit:

http://www.subaru-svx.net/forum/show...ight=shift+kit

I installed the kit on my 96 LSi a year ago and it went perfectly, no problems. I did solder longer wires to the kit to put the switch where I wanted it though.

As I said in the other thread discussing the Small Car shift kit, I believe that the resistor they've soldered in is not the correct resistance, thus the flashing power light. Like John, I added additional wire to allow for a simpler installation. I've done the diagnostic routine on the TCU and it comes back with everything's fine...One of these days I'll actually put a MM across the resistor to see what it reads...
-Bill (an otherwise happy owner of the SC shift kit...)

I can do pix too : Pic of the resistor and then Pic of the installation

If the resistor is wrong, someone should be able to read the bands and tell me if it is or is not correct.

The installation is correct, I have no doubt about that. I built aircraft for a living and left Piper Aircraft as a Production Engineer, not trying to impress, just trying to make the point I am not a shade tree mechanic.

The following is my basic understanding of how this system works.

I presume the resistor is used to trick the TCU that there is a resistance in the circuit, too much and it would act the same as the dropping resistor, so the trick is to determine the minimum resistance needed for the TCU to not respond with an error code, indicating in this case an open circuit. With a WOT, the circuit is opened and the dropping resistor is bypassed, or the TCU thinks there is an open circuit and the shifts are firmer. The soldered resistor is still in series and has whatever function it has in that configuration, if any. When the throttle is closed, so does the switch completing the circuit to the dropping resistor and thereby going back to a stock configuration upon decel, doing away with the hunting on decel.

If there was a wiring issue, there would be hunting on decel since the circuit is open. This should be my first clue of a open circuit or wiring issue.

The only thing that makes sense is that the resistance is too low for my TCU. The rationale behind this is simple, if I had low resistance everything would be fine except for the TCU's threshold for believing there was a resistor online. The system would function just fine, since the circuit is still open as the TCU thinks and it believes there is no resistor inline on accelleration. Once the switch closes upon decel, the dropping resistor is online and the TCU thinks there is a dropping resistor. If the same error flashs for both an open circuit AND the shift kit, then it's clear to me the TCU believes there is an open circuit.

The vaccuum adjustment would have no effect on it unless the circuit was always open and then you would know because your shifting would be stock and vice versa.

Now here is another thought, if the TCU believes there is a system fault, what does it do to compensate for it?

If the downshifts on deceleration are smooth, then it sounds like everything except the resistor is working fine. Perhaps the kit is a bit too sensitive, because although when the torque converter locks up it would normally be considered a no-load condition, it's actually a low-load condition and it might be enough to trigger the vacuum switch. (In my car the torque converter lock up is almost undetectable, but sometimes it locks up under partial load.) I agree that it sounds like the resistor isn't quite working.

Oh well. Minor bug.

One more thing...

I know it "shouldn't" make a difference but... this can't be a coincidence.

Everyone who I know who has successfully installed the kit, myself, Chike, Immortal Suby (check his locker), newsvx, and others has cut the green wire with the yellow stripe and left the green/red one intact.

Trevor, one of our more experienced and knowledgable members, first suggested this when the kit first came out. He also was the one to help smallcar configure the resistance circuit to stop the 16 blinks. Trevor recommended cutting the green/yellow, so I went with his advice and cut the green/yellow one (just to be safe).

I noticed that you had cut the green/red wire instead. Why not reconnect the green/red wire and splice the green/yellow one. Shouldn't take too long . I know it shouldn't make a difference, but... we're talkin' SVX here.


(For much more detailed info on this, do an advanced search keyword: shift kit and the user name as Trevor)

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