TransGo Shift Kit-----Why Does it Exist?

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 12:55 pm

I don't understand why a separate, little company has a $40 (probably $20 wholesale) kit to improve the performance and longevity of Chrysler's own 42RLE transmission.

If it only takes such a small amount of parts & money to improve the performance and longevity of the transmission, one of the most important parts of a vehicle, why wasn't the transmission designed this way in the first place.

You would think the engineers who invented the 42RLE would know better than anyone in the world how to improve their own transmission.

I don't get it.
Does Chrysler want the transmission to wear out faster than it should?
Makes absolutely no sense to me.

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 1:01 pm

Your queastion is just like this one-----Why do aftermarket companies sell lift kits for vehicles? OEM is a state that is a compromise of performance/lasting/cost to consumers,you can't have your cake and eat it to.

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 1:15 pm

tjkj2002 wrote:

Your queastion is just like this one-----Why do aftermarket companies sell lift kits for vehicles? OEM is a state that is a compromise of performance/lasting/cost to consumers,you can't have your cake and eat it to.

A lift kit I can understand. Having less clearance stinks, but they probably do it for legal/insurance reasons. and it has no effect on reliability or longevity. And a lift kit is something that only a small portion of owners would appreciate.

The transmission, on the other hand, is something every owner needs and wants to perform the best it can and last as long as possible. It's only $20 or so in parts. Why don't they just make it good in the first place?
I don't understand Chrysler.

sleeve84028 · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 1:16 pm

The answer is simple. Chrysler has to design all of their vehicles with a massive market in mind. Building a vehicle is a set of comprimises from day one and all of the engineers are looking at a broader picture. Say you take the transmission and firm up the shifts. Now you've upset the group of people that want a "lexus" like shift that is seamless and not noticeable.

Ok, so now tilt that scenirio in the other direction and make the transmission shift smoothly and you've then upset the people who want a decent performaing transmission. So the engineers do studies and analyize data to determine the best possible settings for almost all of the people who want to purchase that particular product.

Say there are over 1 million liberties on the road today. Of those vehicles, how many are registared users of Lost? Now how many registared users of Lost actually want to change out the transmission settings??

myjeepwalks · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 1:29 pm

I've got the transgo reprogram kit for my 45rfe. I love it! :lol:

worth every penny. I dont know about the 42 trans though never driven one.

jcphoto20 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 19, 2006 1:36 am **Posts:** 507

its not rocket science,

they deliberately make your car with limited durability so they can sell you parts to fix it or a new car.

thats just the way it is. they are only trying to make it just reliable enough for you to want to buy another one from them.

they could very easily make a car that lasts for a very long time, but they would make very little if they only sold you a car and never saw you again.

thats how "DEALERS" make their money, on the comeback.

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 2:33 pm

jcphoto20 wrote:

its not rocket science,

they deliberately make your car with limited durability so they can sell you parts to fix it or a new car.

thats just the way it is. they are only trying to make it just reliable enough for you to want to buy another one from them.

they could very easily make a car that lasts for a very long time, but they would make very little if they only sold you a car and never saw you again.

thats how "DEALERS" make their money, on the comeback.

That's dumb !!!
If my Liberty doesn't last a long time with minimal problems I won't be buying another Chrysler product.
If it turns out good then the odds of me buying another one go way up.
I would also recommend it to other people if I think it's a good product.
I think a lot of people want to know their vehicle will last forever, and know they are buying a high-quality vehicle, but the majority will trade before it dies anyway.
Driving a brand new vehicle with new technology and new looks is fun !

jcphoto20 · **Joined:** Sun Nov 19, 2006 1:36 am **Posts:** 507

sorry, thats not dumb, thats the way it is.

what is dumb is saying what i said was dumb, and then backing up what i said with what you said.

accept it and carry on.

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 2:46 pm

jcphoto20 wrote:

sorry, thats not dumb, thats the way it is.

accept it and carry on.

Yeap,that's right.The auto makers don't make but $500-$1000 on a vehicle but make 1000 times more selling you parts to fix it.No way around it since they all do it(execpt auto makers like Bentely,Ferrarii,and all those high dollar limited production cars).

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 3:00 pm

jcphoto20 wrote:

sorry, thats not dumb, thats the way it is.

what is dumb is saying what i said was dumb, and then backing up what i said with what you said.

accept it and carry on.

Sorry. I didn't mean your statement was dumb.
I'm sure it's true. I know they make a ton of money selling parts.
I just get tired of buying stuff nowadays that's low-quality, and then the company thinks I'll buy their product again when it wears out. It's the same with any product.........if I buy it and I think it turned out to be a poor-quality item I'll steer clear of it next time.

But from what I've heard and read the Liberty seems to be a pretty good quality vehicle except for the strange noises and strange shifting and minor stuff. As long as it works as it should I'm happy.

sleeve84028 · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 3:04 pm

I'm pretty sure all of the Chrysler parts are tested to with stand 150,000 miles of normal usage. Or at least that is what the compnent specs call out. Beyond that, parts fail because they are worn out.. There is no engineered decay in the transmission.

unixxx · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 4:15 pm

As tjkj2002 said, the vehicle would cost much more if it were designed to last forever. It costs more to use higher quality materials and manufacturing processes, hire better engineers, and spend more time in the design stage. If auto makers sold fewer parts they'd need to charge more initially for the car. At the end of the day, companies need to be profitable. The transmission isn't designed to explode, it just isn't designed to last forever.

jcphoto20 wrote:

its not rocket science,

they deliberately make your car with limited durability so they can sell you parts to fix it or a new car.

thats just the way it is. they are only trying to make it just reliable enough for you to want to buy another one from them.

they could very easily make a car that lasts for a very long time, but they would make very little if they only sold you a car and never saw you again.

thats how "DEALERS" make their money, on the comeback.

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 5:06 pm

I agree with what everyone is saying.
But, the parts to make the transmission better are something like $20.
They could improve their reputation by improving what seems to be the weak link with Chrysler.
They would get better reviews, and people looking to buy a new vehicle pay attention to those reviews, so they wouldn't lose sales, they would sell more.

Companies with excellent products and reputations always seem to be more successful in the long run.

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 5:18 pm

JohnnyCash wrote:

I agree with what everyone is saying.
But, the parts to make the transmission better are something like $20.
They could improve their reputation by improving what seems to be the weak link with Chrysler.
They would get better reviews, and people looking to buy a new vehicle pay attention to those reviews, so they wouldn't lose sales, they would sell more.

Companies with excellent products and reputations always seem to be more successful in the long run.

I can't say for anybody else,but I don't care about reviews about anything(cars,electronics,and movies).If I want it I'm going to buy it no matter what anybody else said about it.It's sad when good auto manufacturers loose sales because of 1 dumb idiot gave them a bad review.I buy what I like,I like Jeeps(the KJ is my 3rd Jeep),when it comes time to buy another vehicle the first place I'm stopping is a Jeep dealer unless I have a need for a pickup again then I'll go and get a SuperDuty.I can live with all the little junk going wrong because the KJ was my first brand new vehicle(should have seen some of my others I've had,if you can drive it off my property it's your's type of vehicles).Brand loyalty is a big thing in my family,if I was ever to need a tractor,well gosh darn it's going to be green(John Deere) cause that's the only one I trust even if they are rated the lowest by some other dummy cause he can't stand to do a little wrenching on his own junk.My 2 cents,now I'm broke.

GilaMonster · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 5:47 pm

JohnnyCash wrote:

jcphoto20 wrote:

its not rocket science,

they deliberately make your car with limited durability so they can sell you parts to fix it or a new car.

thats just the way it is. they are only trying to make it just reliable enough for you to want to buy another one from them.

they could very easily make a car that lasts for a very long time, but they would make very little if they only sold you a car and never saw you again.

thats how "DEALERS" make their money, on the comeback.

That's dumb !!!
If my Liberty doesn't last a long time with minimal problems I won't be buying another Chrysler product.
If it turns out good then the odds of me buying another one go way up.
I would also recommend it to other people if I think it's a good product.
I think a lot of people want to know their vehicle will last forever, and know they are buying a high-quality vehicle, but the majority will trade before it dies anyway.
Driving a brand new vehicle with new technology and new looks is fun !

Rip open a PC and read the hard drive label, it will have information regarding Mean Time Between Failures. It is expected that the hard drive will fail, and they have attempt to find out when on average.
Same goes for the Auto industry, they don't make them to last, or they would compromise future sale. Same for components.
Hence the expression, "They don't make them like they used to".

unixxx · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 6:15 pm

MTBF is a standard measurement in any industry and often much longer than practical device use. My Jeep PC case has a MTBF of 250,000 hrs minimum. I'm going to buy a new case before 29 years elapse. Regardless, MTBF is more a measure of reliability than life expectancy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBF

Present vehicles are many times better than past vehicles for the same price. A tremendous amount of material science alone goes into ensuring present vehicles don't rust. One of the first EFI systems used vacuum tubes with much smaller MTBF ratings than present transistors.

KY Liberty · **Joined:** Sat Jul 09, 2005 1:46 pm **Posts:** 1195

unixxx wrote:

MTBF is a standard measurement in any industry and often much longer than practical device use. My Jeep PC case has a MTBF of 250,000 hrs minimum. I'm going to buy a new case before 29 years elapse. Regardless, MTBF is more a measure of reliability than life expectancy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBF

Present vehicles are many times better than past vehicles for the same price. A tremendous amount of material science alone goes into ensuring present vehicles don't rust. One of the first EFI systems used vacuum tubes with much smaller MTBF ratings than present transistors.

Remember to look at the average life expectancy though. What the MTBF simply means is, the average failure rate of units that are properly used, maintained, and replaced at the end of their life expectancy. A device with a 100,000 hour MTBF may only have a life expectancy of 1 year, where the device with the 10,000 hour MTBF has a life epectancy of 5 years. If computer componets lasted their MTBF, I wouldn't have to do data recovery on hard drives with hundreds of thousands of hours MTBF's every day.

As for the reason for a shift kit, it changes the personality of the transmission and can cause it to last longer. It shifts quicker and firmer, and locks up better with the 42rle. With the reprogramming kit for the 45rfe, it shifts much faster and firmer. It can cause the transmission to last longer because there is less slippage and time between shifts. From the factory it is setup to give a good compromise of comfort, performance, and reliability.

JohnnyCash · **Posted:** Thu May 10, 2007 8:11 pm

Quote:

As for the reason for a shift kit, it changes the personality of the transmission and can cause it to last longer. It shifts quicker and firmer, and locks up better with the 42rle. With the reprogramming kit for the 45rfe, it shifts much faster and firmer. It can cause the transmission to last longer because there is less slippage and time between shifts. From the factory it is setup to give a good compromise of comfort, performance, and reliability.

If I wanted to get the shift kit could I just have a transmission shop like Cottman install it, or will they just look at me all confused and not have a clue what I'm asking them to do. Where's the best place to go to get this done?

Also would it be something that is pretty safe for a mechanic to install? I can feel the stress level creep up when I think about a mechanic working on a complicated thing like the transmission. I took my old truck in a couple years ago because it wouldn't pass DEQ and that was like major brain surgery for the mechanic. Had my truck for a couple weeks and still couldn't fix it. Never did fix it.

KY Liberty · **Joined:** Sat Jul 09, 2005 1:46 pm **Posts:** 1195

Go over to the Cottman transmission where you live and see if they install shift kits. It shouldn't take more than one day. The one here does, and had even installed them in the 45rfe like I have before. They actually do all my transmission and differential work. They're really experienced with Jeeps.

carroll952 · **Posted:** Fri May 11, 2007 12:07 am

Gotta love our disposable world. Who gets their TVs repaired anymore? (Unless it's under warranty)

Justin

TransGo Shift Kit-----Why Does it Exist?

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