Where did you get the rebuild kit from?
I am doing the same thing. Managed to get the tranny out. I need to rebuild it with new steels/frictions & bushings.
I originally just dropped the pan to change out the solenoids. That helped make the truck move in reverse and forward but it would not shift past the 3rd. On to the rebuild.


Thanks

 

The steels & frictions were from Cobra Transmission. I got one of their 6HP26 master kits and that had everything you need for seals, O-rings, steel plates, friction plates, etc. One note, these are "generic" master kits because some of the BMW trans have more power (?) and I had two friction and one steel left over. I rebuilt each of the drums individually and put the same number of friction/steel back in place.

As for the bushings, I think it was Midwest Transmission Supply. It really doesn't matter where because they are all just the same Sonnax bushing kit. I will say, I didn't replace them all because they are not simple to replace, mine didn't seem too worn, and I didn't want to cause more problems by nicking a machined surface to replace a bushing that was still quite tight. Very much a YMMV activity. A good YouTube video (by Gary Ferraro) shows it being simple but they didn't peel out for me. Instead they broke vertically and I had to carefully chisel them out without marring any surfaces. Nerve wracking!

Good luck and as other put it, it's just an auto trans and very straight forward. The parts only go in to the case in one order. The tricky part for reassembly is making sure you have the various axial needle bearings and flat races in correctly. Get one backwards and it's going to be a bad day. Have the exploded view handy and there's almost no way to get it wrong.

Piece of cake!

 

I will look up those suppliers.

If they are blind bushings, I came up with a way of replacing them and posted this on youtube. I did this when I rebuilt the 4l80e on a suburban. But I made a mistake of buying the rebuild kit on ebay and I found later that the frictions had been sitting too long. Long story short I ended up buying the frictions again.
But that was the 1st transmission I rebuilt and I am no expert so I rather get all the correct info first and not do it again.

Did you buy the manual there too? I assume you got the exploded view from that.

By Mechatronic rebuild (minus solenoids) , did you mean separating it out, replacing the plate and using a sonnax shift kit?

Any neat tricks on plugging the cooler port and breather holes?

Thanks!

 

The exploded view is available free here: 6HP26-28_Catalog.pdf. It's the full parts catalog but shows all the various torque numbers, order of assembly, etc. As for removing the bushings, whatever it takes to get them out but that's an interesting way to get them out. The ones that I didn't do were more because I didn't want to disassemble the planetary and there was zero play in those. Plus, I was running short on time and patience so, back together it went.

I did a full rebuild on the mechatronic unit. Sonnax shift kit, separator plate, and solenoids. In order to put the Sonnax kit in, you have to separate the mechatronic because the clips that hold the plungers in are captive between the halves. Once you separate the two halves, there is no saving that separator plate and reusing it. That is definitely a one use only item and one of the places I checked four or five times to make sure I had the check ***** in the right place. At around $100 for a separator plate, not something you want to buy multiple of.

For plugging the vent and cooler holes, no trick. My only comment about the vent hole was more in jest because when I had it on a stand and did the fill, I didn't even think about plugging it. My foot started feeling weird and when I looked down, I had a shoe full of trans fluid. I didn't want those shoes anyways!

There really aren't any tricks to doing a ZF. It's a very simple transmission and very strong for a Land Rover application; the one in the LR3 is good for 400+hp. Like I commented before, I had 165k miles and the clutch stacks were definitely within tolerance.

One last thing, this manual ZF - TechServiceMan2.pdf shows all of the check ***** on pages 34-35 but I remember not all of these being in there. Like, two weren't applicable to the LR version of the 6HP26. When separating the halves of the body, make sure you do it so the ***** are in the passageways and you can check where they are. I had printed those pages and circled the ones I found and when I reassembled, only put the ***** back that I took out. The Sonnax kit comes with all of the replacement ***** and there are locations in the body for them, but I didn't find it when I disassembled so I didn't put them in.

Easy peasy.

 

Thank you for the pdf and all the tips.
Appreciate it.

 

It's been a while but when I disassembled the transmission I found out the A/E drum was messed up. The friction and steels and practically seized and scored the drum. It took me a few months but I managed to get one form ebay (a 2008 LR3 transmission) This was in good condition when I took it all apart. Anyways I rebuilt it and it ready to go in.

Except I was wondering if I can use the mechtronics that came with the 2008 tranny. My original was 2006. The 2008 is all nice and clean including the valve body and fluid inside was super clean. I did some reading and from what I gathered the reprogramming is necessary only if the make/model of the vehicles that the zf tranny goes in is different. So since they are both from a LR3 with 2 years difference, would it work? I would hate to drop the pan just to change back the mechtronics after putting it all back together,

Last question - I assume you are using the ford 6r60 pan gasket (Transtec BL3Z7A191C Transmission Pan Gasket, Bonded 6R60 6R75 6R80 06-18) with the zf replacement metal pan? And how much did you fill with?

Thank You.

 

Cant you just re use your mechatronics unit ? I wouldn't go by a set refill figure, fill it then check using the normal procedure.

 

I can ... but the 2008 unit has nice clean fluid whereas my valve body had a few metal pieces form the drum/steel/frictions grinding. So i figured the 2008 mechtronics is probably in better shape. My unit is probably the safe way to go except if someone can confirm that the 2008 mechtronics can work without programming.

for the fill, in the previous posts in this thread, the transmission was prefilled before putting the pan cover back on. Makes life easier. So i was wondering how much they filled it with assuming they used a metal pan.

 

I like to say there is no specific quantity of fluid because there is a fill procedure and that procedure does not change with the pan. With engine running in park and trans warm, fill until there is just a very slow drip coming from the fill plug. With the factory plastic pan this means about 6 quarts, but again its not about quantity is about were the level is when warmed up and and idling.

 

Yes , that would be the standard way to do it, but I was trying to do it the way abran quoted in the above posts "Do a bench fill on the trans with pan off upside down"