Paddle shift in a Riv?

Hello,
I am new to the board and just wanted to say hello and to disscus my new project I am going to use two of the steering wheel buttons to paddle shift my tranny throught the gears and I will be able to select between the stock PCM and my Addon shift modual anyone else interested? Comments?
Thanks

Cool idea. How do you plan to do this?

Well their are two shift solenoids that shift the tranny and allows all four gear selections I plan to use a microcontroller and control the two solenoids. Their will not be an engine break in the 4T60E but will allow you to up shift in a drag race situation at any RPM you want. I know when I pull my shifter down to 1st gear it will shift up to second at about 45 mph no matter if I leave the shiter in 1st gear. I think the PCM tells the tranny to do this and my tranny manual does not tell if this condition is PCM controlled or not. I will know when I get it installed on my 96 rivi. I have been working on a complete TCU tranny controller for the 4L60E in my chevy truck when I though about this project.

Is it possible to use the transmission, steering column(w/paddle shift),and associated wiring,etc. from a "Comp-G" pkg Pontiac GTP? And is it possible to use a heads up display,( H.U.D.) from same car in a Riv? Sounds crazy, and dont know if I would, but I have most of the parts and I have the time,so.....
Also if anyone is interested I have An interior pkg from a Pontiac Grand Prix,GTP Daytona 500. 1 of 2000 cars made. The car is now totaled and gone but many parts remain. Pm me if intrested in parts or pkg deal. But more important, is any of this possible? If so, what exactly would I need. Spare dash pad obviously to practice/template the HUD but will it fit in our dash(cave)? And will our wiring harness work or do I need harness and PCM from pontiac? Paddle shift. Whole new monster. Any feedback be nice,Thx.

Any thoughts on the paddle shift idea, please post here. Anything related to HUD, please reply in this thread: https://rivperformance.editboard.com/t3829-hud-display-in-riviera

Thanks,
Admin

I have a 97 supercharged riv, and i love every second i spend driving it. its comfortable quick and classy. the only thing is i always wish i had a little more control rather than the automatic transmission doing everything. i was wondering if paddle shifters could be added? i've seen products for this, but no matter how much research i do, i cant seem to find out if they can be added to any car with an automatic or they have to be stock. if anyone has the answer to this or has done anything like this and could tell me about it, it would be much appreciated!!
thanks!
jake

Jake,
All I did was Google your question and I got this:

http://news.hspn.com/articles/936/1/New-Paddle-Shifter-For-Any-Automatic/Page1.html

Took me a few minutes.

I like this idea too.I spoke with a manufacture of American made "UNIVERSAL" paddle shifters,he said it couldnt be done.not with our tranny.cant remember the exact technical/mechanical reason why?all I know is I hung up a little bummed out.I'm still hopeful though........

http://www.magnashift.com/index.html
Robo, these will work on our transmissions, also the 4t65. Full manual control. They also sell the transmission connectors you need. A guy had it on his 4t65e on 3800pro once, but didn't document much. A fiero guy designed the first version awhile ago for his 4t60e cause his getrag wasn't holding the power of his l67, but he wanted to still be able to manual control it. This is what I will be doing after my low mile engine build and transmission rebuild. Going to do ratchet style where the gear indicator is beside the gear selector. I've got a dash display for gear, so nothing will be lost.

dang! when ya know, ya know, when ya dont ya dont. one more thing I gotta save up for!
after all is sed and done I'll be sleeping in my car...

I love my riv, but I always wish I had a little more control and I get tired of the automatic transmission. I was wondering if anyone has ever found a kit or a way to add paddle shifters to there riv? It could be that or just anything of the sort, just something to give you control over the shifts.
Any advice is much appreciated thanks!

DHP or HPtuners software - gives you a lot of control over when the shifts happen, and how they happen. It's not the same as manual, but it's better in many ways. Of course, you can always choose your gear manually using the floor shifter.

AA wrote:

DHP or HPtuners software - gives you a lot of control over when the shifts happen, and how they happen. It's not the same as manual, but it's better in many ways. Of course, you can always choose your gear manually using the floor shifter.

how safe is it to do it that way? she allways feels like she dont like it,at least on my 95..

Holding shifts by locking out a lower gear is fine. I've heard it's not good to downshift from higher gear with your foot off the gas, but I've done it many times with no harm. I've also heard it's better to manually shift down when your foot is on the gas, rather than to let the PCM do it. Once I had a vac leak causing rough shifts, so took the car to the dealership for a test drive, the tech was manually shifting all over the place, even more than I'd usually do. He seemed to have confidence in what he was doing, too.

interesting..I usually shift around when I come up to a steep hill rather than let her lug up it.

Nothing wrong with that. I'd do the same.

I do the same type of thing with perfshift. The normal is stock and I tuned the perfshift settings rather aggressively. They are different enough that the car usually shifts immediately once I toggle it on or off. I'm pretty sure The PCM has different speed tables for what gear or range you select. Tinytuner gives you access to them individually. With the factory program, the car will still shift past 1st even if you keep the shifter in "1" but I'm going to try to change that so it doesn't for track burnouts. That would cover everything I could want to otherwise do manually. I'd love to have button shifting but the perfshift button right on the steering wheel is satisfactory for me.

so if you are in drive and you hit 4th gear, (super premature like always) it's ok to push the shift in and drop it to 3rd? you won't F anything up? I always thought it was a cardinal rule never to do that?

After reading about this today i tried doing some down shifts from OD to 3 keeping my foot on the gas, and i would get a clunk. Did i read something wrong in AA's post?

If you are applying throttle in OD, downshifting into 3rd should have the same result as if the PCM downshifted into 3rd, except it should happen earlier.

Quote :

so if you are in drive and you hit 4th gear, (super premature like always) it's ok to push the shift in and drop it to 3rd? you won't F anything up? I always thought it was a cardinal rule never to do that?

If there were a cardinal rule against manually downshifting an automatic, I don't think GM would design the shifter to allow it. Jerky downshifts are a common complaint when manually shifting. I think you need to apply a good amount of throttle to get it right. Mine doesn't jerk when I shift, but maybe my technique is different. It's also possible those who feel this are in need of new trans/motor mounts.

Quote :

I'd love to have button shifting but the perf shift button right on the steering wheel is satisfactory for me.

Mine goes about it a different way. The "normal" shift table is programmed to gradually use both economy and perf shift settings (more aggressive, actually) depending on throttle %. Low throttle operation is less aggressive, then blending to perf shift mode as throttle is increased. I like having the shifts adapt with throttle application.

That works out overall but it's less ideal when you want to be ready to do something before you do it. The best example I can think of is when you accel up to speed and then let off, it'll relax and upshift so then when you want to get on it again, there's another gear to downshift through to get to a good accel range again. The transmission can adapt to the new conditions but it can't tell what you want ahead of time. An alternate shift program at your fingertips gives you that.

Even though my shift pressures are reduced at lighter throttle to avoid being too firm, the shifts are still quick, and the downshift threshold is lower than stock. For example, in 4th gear @ 65 MPH, a 40% throttle input results in 3rd gear downshift. Since a 65 MPH cruise on my car is about 12% throttle, that's a change of only 28%. The stock shift map requires 50% throttle just to release TCC lock-up. That's a noticeable improvement in response.

Upshift time = 200 ms, Downshift time = 200 ms. In comparison, the fastest manual clutch shift times are in the 500 ms range. Are my shifts really slowing me down enough to be worried about it?

Or, couldn't I just lock-out 3rd or 2nd gear if I need to be ready for serious driving?

what exactly is perfshift?

Information on Perf(ormance) Shift: https://rivperformance.editboard.com/t5281-write-up-performance-shift-knob

where can i get something like this? sorry for the dumb questions, im new to this so im just tryin to learn as much as i can before i start making changes