I am not an auto tranny guy but I ended up with one anyways and 2G parts cars are too far and few in between for me to do a manual swap. Anyways, is there a way to directly control the shifter solenoid? Seeing as how it makes a racheting sound when I shift (apparently normal), my guess is that it's not the stick that is controlling the gears, it is a solenoid somewhere that is being actuated by a cable. So is there a way to directly control the solenoid with out the stick? It'll help get rid of that whole anit-automatic stigma. Not to mention having no shifter would look bitchin, IMO. I am thinking either an electronically controlled solenoid with "x" amount of positions to actuate the cable or some way of circumventing the cable altogether and only messing with the main solenoid.

Look in this forum for info on the autostick, we are trying to get this exact thing you speak of working.

As for shifting via the solenoids, this is a BAD idea, our trannies are controlled by the TCU and thus clutch pressures and volumes are electronically controlled by this.

In essence using the solenoids/the auto shifter on our center console, will force the tranny to shift when it is not expecting to without properly engageing the clutches the way it was designed to.

I see
so the shifter is actually controlling something in the TCU, which passes a signal to shift gears? I wasn't thinking the autostick sort of way. I was thinking instead of shifting park - into drive - into reverse - using the stick, we control it with, say buttons or paddles instead.

i think he means like the oldskool 60's button automatics chryslers had... right?

it can be done, the shifter in the console is a mechanical connection to the tranny/valve body/transaxel range switch. you could rig up a linear actuator with some electronics to stop it at the correct spots to duplicate the movement of the shifter but as far as driving/shifting gears goes thats controlled via the solenoid pack which has an electrical connection to the TCU.

that's exactly what I meant. Just like the push-button auto, yeah, except i was thinking more along the ferrari line of things, so I would combine the push-button shifter with the autostick (which I don't even think works). Two buttons - down & up. Pushing both gets you neutral. Upshift out of neutral gets 1st. Downshift gets reverse. Pushing both buttons again gets you park. Once in 1st, up and down choose gears. Complicated... I'll need a few relays and I'll probably shoot myself wiring it all up.

its more than just a few relays, you actually need a linear actuator ,stepper motor or something like it that will mechanically move the linkage ontop of the tranny, right infront of the battery just a little lower you will see the eye hook connection from the shifter cable, you would need to have some logic that will move the stepper motor to the correct position then you can do the autostick.