Club 80-90 Forums

My 2.1carb auto needs very little encouragement to kick down a gear , even at 60mph .
The van was originally a 1.9dg and I swapped my trusted DJ with a carb into it when I got it , so it’s nothing to do with ECU ( it hasn’t got one ) .
when I bought it the throttle cable was badly installed , and it was not getting anywhere near full revs on the journey home ( took forever to get up to 70mph) so when we swapped the engine over we adjusted the throttle cable as per the Bentley , so the kick down should be in the last inch between the pedal and the floor stop , but you can be trundling a long at 60mph and a flat road with you foot only barely resting on the loud pedal and just a slight incline and it will kick down . 

it’s also reluctant to change up into top gear sometimes , it will hold 2nd to way up over 50mph if I don’t just ease off the throttle for a second . 
Occasionally it will outright refuse to go into top gear until I shift out of D into N and back to D .
ive looked online , but I can’t find these symptoms, anyone else have any experience like this , and if so how did you sort it ? 

As you know Steve I have an auto but have never had this problem with mine. Do you go on the samba? as the yanks have more experience with these auto boxes than we do.

Yeah I. Have looked on samba, but I can’t find the exact symptoms ….
it changes up into 2nd at the correct speed , and sometime into third at the correct speed , but sometimes holds 2nd too long and if I let my foot off it will change up , but kicks back down with little or no throttle pressure ….
im thinking it might be the governor…

Could well be mate. These boxes seem to be a black art. When my box started changing up and down it turned out to be the ATF and final drive fluid mixing. But your symptoms seem to be different. How is your ATF level? I remember another box being stupid with the gearing that turned out to be the ATF filter breaking up and clogging the oilways in the valve body.

ATF looks clean and the correct level , but I think I will change the filter anyways , do the easy stuff first .
 

Sounds like throttle cable/rod adjustment to me. If you lengthen the cable slightly, but shorten the rod between box relay lever and carb, the box will see slightly less pedal at full throttle at the carb. See if that helps it change up.
Do you have the Bentley info? P37.15-19
Shift 2-3 should be below 45mph at full throttle, but around 55mph on kickdown.

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Thanks Andrew , I was thinking along those lines , and I do have the Bentley manwel.
I will take another look at the throttle set up , when I can get an operative to assist .