[rismo]

Hi fellow forum members,

Just for your information, I have dropped my car yesterday at my ZF gearbox engineer. He started today with analysing the diagnostic information and the physical damage of my AT. Based on that he will start the development of my new AT with the aim to get an AT able to handle my load while keeping the original charater of the box.

The aim is to develop an high HP / High Torque solution.

To be continued!

[themyst]

Oh no, what happened? Slipping under load, rough shifts?

I would guess the friction rings are the weakest link.

[rismo]

I have now 150k km on the odo... it started 80k km ago... some squizing noise, which initialy went away by refreshing the oil... now it has difficulties to shift quick and it's just slipping before lock....

The ZF engineer is probably one of the best engineers outside of ZF's factories... he is doing workshops all over the world... so we decided to join forces, he will use my box as an template for his 6hp21 strenghtend version.
Check my old threads about this topic...

[happy4nk8er]

Very nice, keep us AT guys posted on findings.

[tscdennab]

And now the big question: how much will it cost ?

[enrita]

Keep us posted! I feel i need a tcu reflash myself.... Otherwise mine is holding fine after level 10 rebuild with very fast shifts (cobb might have a say to it as well since the the right torque is given to the AT and level raised)

[rismo]

The price might be around that of a new AT.
Diagnostics will be finalized end of this week. And I will start with a new AT without rebuild. From that point the plan is to develop the new parts.

[fun2drive]

Wouldn't it be wise if possible to use the guts of the 6HP26 which can handle the torque and more horsepower inside the case of the 6HP19/21?
I am guessing that is what the ZF engineer is aiming to do?

[rismo]

:-) Might be the track, but it's quite harsh, I'm in touch with zf's head of service (very technical person) but let's see were we end up with...

[TurboBimmer]

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[rismo]

Hmm.... very bad news....

My old gearbox is completly ruined... clutchplate 3-5 are just gone... my engineer is heavily wondering how I could get the car at his place..
The temps of the box have been for max 1 hour in the 110 degrees celcius range.. over a total of 150k km) thats the absolute upper limit of allowable heat... the conclusion of this is that cooling is not the main concern at this moment.

The other bad news is: hp26 parts will not fit, there is no suffcient space within the housing... a long shot might be that we are going to develop custom parts... but we need to further analyse this.

The oil pump on the other hand is very well able to deal with the load.

Also he took a good look at the level10 upgrade kit... He qualified these parts as no real upgrades unfortunatly... otherwise he would have ordered them for me. (Quote: very easy to sell those parts without any guarantee... I just do not want to sell such things to you)

His main point would be to start digging into the box software, but this is quite harsh. I personally already contacted Alpina, but they are not willing to sell the software on a non Alpina box... period.

I will get some pics of the opened box in the next days.. hopefully I can post some up here... to be continued... but not looking well besided the fact that I will get a new box...

[ZTUNER]

Originally Posted by rismo123

Also he took a good look at the level10 upgrade kit... He qualified these parts as no real upgrades unfortunatly... otherwise he would have ordered them for me. (Quote: very easy to sell those parts without any guarantee... I just do not want to sell such things to you)

His main point would be to start digging into the box software, but this is quite harsh. I personally already contacted Alpina, but they are not willing to sell the software on a non Alpina box... period.

I will get some pics of the opened box in the next days.. hopefully I can post some up here... to be continued... but not looking well besided the fact that I will get a new box...

Agree with him about level 10. They just use higher friction clutch packs that they price at 10x the price. Its a worthless company with a gift for gab. Hope the zf engineer figures out better alternatives.

Harry

[tscdennab]

Originally Posted by rismo123

Also he took a good look at the level10 upgrade kit... He qualified these parts as no real upgrades unfortunatly... otherwise he would have ordered them for me. (Quote: very easy to sell those parts without any guarantee... I just do not want to sell such things to you)

Well, do you really want to spend a large amount of money on a new gearbox, or is it more cost effective to get the no-guarantee parts ? I would get the no-guarantee parts, honestly.

[rismo]

Originally Posted by tscdennab

Well, do you really want to spend a large amount of money on a new gearbox, or is it more cost effective to get the no-guarantee parts ? I would get the no-guarantee parts, honestly.

In my case I have a pretty good deal.

BMW asked me 7000 euro inc labor and oil... for a new box...
Multiple revision companies charge 4000 euro inc parts....
The parts set of Level10 is above the price of the OEM parts set of a revision company
I now get a new box + guarantee + labor etc (first claim -> no questions asked) for the price of a revision...

But I see your point, on the otherhand the claims that come with the parts are not right... so you buy parts that come with no guarantee, unclear how they will hold up, unclear what impact they might have and actualy should come with a software modification... (And I keep my comment decent... there is some more doubt about these parts)
I personaly would go for OEM parts in that case...
But hopefully we will come with a solution that will raise the torque limit....

[enrita]

The box software TCU needs to know the torque sent to it in order to handle it . If you use a piggyback i dont think this is the case . Only stock torque is delivered. This might be one of the biggest issues IMHO if you just confirmed the oil temp wasn't.
Would be great to know as well the why they thought the level 10 rebuild kit was not enough?
So far my rebuild kit from level 10 is working great, really fast and tight shifts pushing over 450 whp.

[rismo]

Originally Posted by enrita

The box software TCU needs to know the torque sent to it in order to handle it . If you use a piggyback i dont think this is the case . Only stock torque is delivered. This might be one of the biggest issues IMHO if you just confirmed the oil temp wasn't.
Would be great to know as well the why they thought the level 10 rebuild kit was not enough?
So far my rebuild kit from level 10 is working great, really fast and tight shifts pushing over 450 whp.

Hi Enrita,

I know that you are really happy with level10 upgrade... I think that is a very positive thing... and I hope it will stay that way... I'm not realy the person to judge...as i'm far from qualified to judge AT upgrades... I just receive too much mixed feedback about the possibilties and limitations of this box and the claims some companies make that cannot be matched with the information I recevied from the different parties I'm talking with (Alpina, ZF and the engineer working on the car)

In all honesty I hope L10 did a great job, on the other hand I also hope my guy knows what he is doing (fingers crossed ;-))... but at the end it would be great to have multiple solutions available for this car...

I'm also interested to see how a brand new AT behaves with my HP/Tq... especially knowing that I have been driving without gear 3-5 for more then 50k km (lol) (Which I really did not feel that much about besides now and then jerking between shifts and some weird noises)

[tofu-]

Originally Posted by enrita

The box software TCU needs to know the torque sent to it in order to handle it .

not sure why none of the top vendors (burger, vishnu, cobb) have looked into tcu flashing. it certainly will be something no one has done before...

[rismo]

Yep... but it seems to be quite complex... Alpina has somehow a great deal with BMW... Even ZF has limited access towards the BMW specific software config.

The software of the box exists of two parts: ZF part and a vendor/car model specific part....
I have not found anyone who is able to manage this software outside BMW/Alpina...

[ajsalida]

Originally Posted by tofu-

not sure why none of the top vendors (burger, vishnu, cobb) have looked into tcu flashing. it certainly will be something no one has done before...

Need something like this:

http://www.tciauto.com/tc/tcir-ez-tcutm.html

[dlbrooks18]

Sorry to hear, please keep us posted, hope you find the most affordable solution.

[805beemer]

Instead of swapping parts would the whole 335d tranny bolt up to an n54? Would it just be the tcu thats the hard part?

[rismo]

Originally Posted by 805beemer

Instead of swapping parts would the whole 335d tranny bolt up to an n54? Would it just be the tcu thats the hard part?

Yep... "impossible" to have it programmed into a 335i ecu... besides the rpm limit that a diesel box has...
Even if you can get it programmed into the car.. you will have quite some challenges when you need an official BMW ecu update...