Home Forums Gear Hunting Trucks and Four-Wheel Drives 2009 Silverado transmission woes

I do not know what long term luck I will have with my Tundra, I know it will be heading to the dealer for transmission fluid replacemnt before the 60K driveline warranty ends. I do know that it is one of the smoothest shifting transmissions I have owned . Knowing what I know about Silverado transmissions I doubt I would buy another for that reason alone.

And I can't figure out for the life of me why my friend did.

GM has satanic marketing "Like a Rock"

(Old, high mileage fluid becomes somewhat abrasive with all the fine clutch material particles, and will actually help worn clutches to engage with out slipping. Sooo, what happens to a lot of high mileage transmissions that are serviced for the first time? New fluid, which doesn't have the abrasive particles, does have a fresh additive pack which is more "slippery", results in slippage because the clutches are likely worn and glazed. Not the mechanic's fault. I will not service a transmission in my shop with more than 90k miles on it, if I can't verify previous service at 40-50k miles. I'm not gonna be "that guy".
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Unsure if it has not been changed dont!

This if unsure if it has not been changed dont![/quote]

Guy that used to live in my neighborhood had an older Chevy Avalanche with 200+ on it with no transmission service. He asked me about it one day after i serviced my truck and I told him not to even bother unless he wanted a big repair bill.

The 4L80E is a 3/4 - 1 Ton transmission. The 4L60E is what is in the 1/2 tons. Whole different animal.

If the 4L60E is serviced every 50K miles on a daily driver or 30k miles on something that Tows a trailer they can be an ok transmission. My dads 2004 has 245k miles on the original 4L60E but it was serviced (Flushed, then Filter/fluid change) every 50k miles.
I on the other hand got 180k miles on my 2000 4L60E before i started loosing 4th gear. Got it rebuilt with goodies and proceeded to start drag racing and towing more (heads/cam/Turbo charged/Nitrous setup on the truck) and broke 15 more of the 4L60E before figuring out how to swap the 4L80E in to the 1500 trucks and put 200k miles (600+HP) on that 4L80E and still living today.

Now i just go ahead and throw away the 4L60E and replace it with a 4L80E in the older trucks (Pre 2009).
Changes everything on abusing the truck, no more weak transmission troubles.


RULE OF THUMB: If transmission hasn't been serviced before ~100k miles, Don't service it. Run it till it dies and start over.
Ive seen it 9 out of 10 times. Service and then it starts slipping.

Just for the fun of it we tried it on my brothers 2500HD. (6.0/4L80E) 345k miles on the original trans fluid, still shifting fine. Flushed it, changed filter and fluid. Trans burnt clutches within 50 miles.

A 2009 Silverado wouldn't have a 4L60, it'd have a 6L80....regardless pretty much everything said above still applies.

As good as a GM 3/4 ton rides, and as good as the 6.0/6L90 combo is, I'm not sure why there are so many 1/2 tons bought these days. You can get a 3/4 ton for the same or sometimes less, and it is a much more capable and durable truck. Gas mileage is the only downside I see.

Absolutely correct. I just priced one out on the chevy site and it actually appears to be lower priced. 4.10 gear ratio in the gasser

The late 08 and early 09s had the 4L60E, the late 09+ got the 6L80Es.
But yea the same applies with the servicing of them.

The 6L90 should be running Dexron VI, why did the "mechanic" add Lucas?

I would expect the "mechanic" to fork over the 2,500 bucks.

Every time I have taken a vehicle to have its automatic transmission to be serviced,the transmission soon went out. Chevy,Chevy,Toyota.

I service mine every 50k and have never burned one up. I’ve had to upgrade one on my previous Cummins when I turned up the wick on the motor, but I can’t blame the transmission for that. 1060 lb/ft to the wheels is too much to ask a stock transmission to live with.

Update on the transmission repair. The repaired transmission was installed. He said it shifted hard from 1st to 2nd and then fine from there. He took it back to the shop and they ran some diagnostics while they were driving the truck and determined there was an issue with the torque converter. He gets a new Torque converter tomorrow.

Never ever had an issue with a Toyota transmission except the 1973 Corolla I drove after I got out of HS. Bands burned up on it , it was a 2 speed transmission. I have owned many many toyotas since then as has my brother and never an issue with a transmission.

Ya think you had enough torque ?

The first mechanic added Lucas additive after my brother told him it was shifting funny.

I've almost come to the conclusion that unless you tow a lot it may be more cost effective to never change it. I don't own a Chevy, but I've seen too many transmissions go 250,000-300,000 miles on the factory fluid. There are some guys with Toyota's pushing 400,000 miles. Assuming it is a decent transmission to start with. The guys who change it religiously only seem to get another 50K out of one at most. There are some poor designs out there that seem to go 100K no matter what you do. My son and daughter both ran into that issue with Nissan car transmissions dying at about 100K. One in a Chevy SUV. Who would have thought Chevy was using Nissan transmissions?

It is heat, not miles that kills the fluid. For guys who never tow, or tow light loads occasionally and rarely or never let the fluid get much over 200* changing it isn't as important. The more time over about 210* the more often. Ever hit 250* and it should be changed ASAP even if it only has a few hundred miles on it.

What kind of fu cling shop rebuilds a tranny and then uses the used torque converter? Just asking for problems there. Shaking head here...

I agree, that is dumber than dirt.............