engine and drivetrain I contacted ZF yesterday...

[PatAllen]

About the 3HP12 transmission. I was requesting repair manual or any info.

All they have is some microfiches, that of course they dont want to scan.

so they are not able to provide any info at all for this transmission, altough its their first design ever...its like if ford where not able to provide info about their T model... ARGHH !!

so all we have is the blue book and some Peugeot manuals for them. No spring lenght, presure openings, springs tension, shutter valves purposes and position,...it seems i collected more info than ZF do. lol...

[tiitouring02]

who did you talk to at ZF?

[PatAllen]

Steve Jaffe.

[Napes]

Pat - this is why I just bit-the-bullet and purchased a rebuilt unit from the company in the south Bay Area (San Francisco) that the ZF technicians at the 2004 O'Fest in Pasedena recommended. The guys at the shop are all Germans, with marginal English, but were very helpful and accomodating.

Bob Napier

[scestes]

Pat - this is why I just bit-the-bullet and purchased a rebuilt unit from the company in the south Bay Area (San Francisco) that the ZF technicians at the 2004 O'Fest in Pasedena recommended. The guys at the shop are all Germans, with marginal English, but were very helpful and accomodating.

Bob Napier

Do you have their info?

[Guest Anonymous]

I thought about contacting ZF but dropped this idea after reading this article (page 5). BTW it's a bit of info about 4HP22 for us.

[02for2]

Pat - this is why I just bit-the-bullet and purchased a rebuilt unit from the company in the south Bay Area (San Francisco) that the ZF technicians at the 2004 O'Fest in Pasedena recommended. The guys at the shop are all Germans, with marginal English, but were very helpful and accomodating.

Bob Napier

What did that go for and do you have a source? TIA

Cheers!

[Napes]

Contact info:

MZF,Inc.

Peter Schmid Transmissions

1331 Rollins Rd.

Burlingame, CA 94010

650/348-3900 Fax 650/348-3019

www.peterschmid.com Email: mzfinc@pacbell.net

In Sept of 2004 the cost was $2,000, ($500 core charge, which they promply refunded upon receipt of my old tranny), with $200 shipping charge to Tucson, AZ

Hope this helps.

Bob Napier

This for the reconditioned 3HP12/20 tranny with torque converter.

[PatAllen]

a rebuilded unit wont give me what i want. theses transmissions are designed to shift too early. they are very marginal by design and can be modified a bit to accomodate different needs.

i want to change the rpm shift point, thats it. otherwise nothing wrong with mine, the kick-down work and it shift "to the spec", ie, very low.

if i could get ahold of theses ZF guys in the bay area, maybe they know better and could tel me what can be done. I collected enough info and am 99.9% sure that i can simply lighten the governor weight to raise the rpm shifting point.

do you have their contact ??

[PatAllen]

I thought about contacting ZF but dropped this idea after reading this article (page 5). BTW it's a bit of info about 4HP22 for us.

ive read it too, very funny. ZF should kick their asses a bit to provide support, especialy considering the amount of vehicles still on the road with such old tranys.

[Napes]

Pat - I have the kick down on both our automatics adjusted to shift at 5500 rpm under full acceleration. If I want more revs, say for autocrossing, I just leave it in the gear I want with the selector. Except for a short stretch between turn 10 and 11 at Sears Point Raceway, Steve Dinan, my instructor at the ' 94 O'Fest, just left my car in 2nd at between 6200 and 6500 rpm. That worked OK.

Bob Napier

[tiitouring02]

Pat, I will speak with Steve Jaffe and see what i can do. Please understand, the 3HP12 hase been out of production for better then 30 years. Industry support for cars past the end of production is only mandated for 10 years. In other words the technical information has been long moved to the "back of the filing cabinet" because there is little to no demand for it. I too have been looking for some information for the 3HP12 in my recently acquired NK. I'm having problems getting it, and I WORK for ZF.

Any manual that may still exist out there is paper or fiche, and will have to be dug out, and scanned etc etc. I think you can appreciate that ZF, like most companies these days, is operating with fewer people doing more. I know Steve and the rest of the people in that department. They are all car guys and would love to help when and where they can, but if they were to try and handle special requests like this from every enthusiast out there they'd be completely buried. We get requests like this every day from not only people like yourself, but from corvette owners, ford truck owners, porsche, and audi owners. Just to name a few. These calls are in addition to all of our "regular" business calls from the OEMs and our large parts customers in the independent aftermarket who's business keeps our lights on.

ZF corporately has recently started a program to support older products, much like BMW MT..er..BMW Classic. Its called ZF Tradition. They are charged with developing programs to support older ZF products in the field. Much like the original MT division at BMW, they are crawling before they walk, and not only have to do it for car transmissions, but for bus, truck, heavy equipment, and so on, and not just for German manufacturers, but for manufacturers around the world! So, not everything will be available immediately, and some things might never be.

To our friend Mr Guest. He might consider that an article published about ZF 16 years ago, might be passed its "best before" date. I certainly wont defend the responses the author got from whomever he contacted at ZF, but I can say that the story is ancient history, and the "issues" with 4HPs were adressed as best as possible at the time. Remanufactured units that came from ZF were always updated to the latest technical specs and were definite improvements upon earlier models. I can also tell you that the 4HP24 in the 750iL's didnt have near the same issue, and were more then capable of handing the performance of the V12. As a matter of fact, a friend of mine has run a 750 in one of the 24 hours of Lemons races, and the car (and 4HP24 trans) ran flawlessly. Subsequent generations of 5 and 6 speec automatic transmissions are generational leaps in technology, and today are incredibly robust and have a service life of many years.

[PatAllen]

Pat, I will speak with Steve Jaffe and see what i can do. Please understand, the 3HP12 hase been out of production for better then 30 years. Industry support for cars past the end of production is only mandated for 10 years. In other words the technical information has been long moved to the "back of the filing cabinet" because there is little to no demand for it. I too have been looking for some information for the 3HP12 in my recently acquired NK. I'm having problems getting it, and I WORK for ZF.

Any manual that may still exist out there is paper or fiche, and will have to be dug out, and scanned etc etc. I think you can appreciate that ZF, like most companies these days, is operating with fewer people doing more. I know Steve and the rest of the people in that department. They are all car guys and would love to help when and where they can, but if they were to try and handle special requests like this from every enthusiast out there they'd be completely buried. We get requests like this every day from not only people like yourself, but from corvette owners, ford truck owners, porsche, and audi owners. Just to name a few. These calls are in addition to all of our "regular" business calls from the OEMs and our large parts customers in the independent aftermarket who's business keeps our lights on.

ZF corporately has recently started a program to support older products, much like BMW MT..er..BMW Classic. Its called ZF Tradition. They are charged with developing programs to support older ZF products in the field. Much like the original MT division at BMW, they are crawling before they walk, and not only have to do it for car transmissions, but for bus, truck, heavy equipment, and so on, and not just for German manufacturers, but for manufacturers around the world! So, not everything will be available immediately, and some things might never be.

To our friend Mr Guest. He might consider that an article published about ZF 16 years ago, might be passed its "best before" date. I certainly wont defend the responses the author got from whomever he contacted at ZF, but I can say that the story is ancient history, and the "issues" with 4HPs were adressed as best as possible at the time. Remanufactured units that came from ZF were always updated to the latest technical specs and were definite improvements upon earlier models. I can also tell you that the 4HP24 in the 750iL's didnt have near the same issue, and were more then capable of handing the performance of the V12. As a matter of fact, a friend of mine has run a 750 in one of the 24 hours of Lemons races, and the car (and 4HP24 trans) ran flawlessly. Subsequent generations of 5 and 6 speec automatic transmissions are generational leaps in technology, and today are incredibly robust and have a service life of many years.

Well, i dont want to bother them at all, i was just expecting that some sort of manual was existing with more details than the BMW blue book. If they dont have anything, ill buy that idea, altought it sounds quite impossible that NO info exist at all. I know its old and is collecting dust, but they must know better. Its theirs very first transmission ever, they should care more about this fact imho.

[PatAllen]

Pat - I have the kick down on both our automatics adjusted to shift at 5500 rpm under full acceleration. If I want more revs, say for autocrossing, I just leave it in the gear I want with the selector. Except for a short stretch between turn 10 and 11 at Sears Point Raceway, Steve Dinan, my instructor at the ' 94 O'Fest, just left my car in 2nd at between 6200 and 6500 rpm. That worked OK.

Bob Napier

what do you mean, adjusted to shift at 5500 rpm, how do you do that ?

i dont race that car.

Isnt the purpose of an automatic transmission to let it shift "automatically", what the point then to continuously play with the stick ? this is what i want to correct.

As i said i just want to change the rpm shift point at light loads. it shift at 20-30mph wich is quite anoying.

[Napes]

The point at which the car shifts up to the next gear, under full throttle, is controled by the kickdown rod that goes straight down from the throttle rod from the firewall to the carb. I don't remember whether lengthening or shortening it increases the rpm shift point, but it's probably in the Haynes Manual or the Blue book. It's been many years since I dialed mine in is why I don't remember. Maybe someone here will answer that for you.

Bob Napier