Installing The Atomic Transmission Controller For The New E4OD
Once the decision was made to upgrade the transmission, the next job was to figure out how it was going to be controlled. The E4OD was not released for a few more years after this truck was manufactured. This was built in the pre-ODBII days. Electronic controls in cars and trucks at that time was still in its infancy. Luckily for me MSD Performance offers a robust transmission controller along with the necessary harnesses and hardware necessary to make it perform.
Being a part of the Holley family of brands, this was a sponsored product for which I am very grateful. Installation was very simple with the transmission specific wiring harness. There were only a few connections to the truck that had to be made. Power and ground being the most obvious. There was also a connection to ignition and to the throttle position sensor (TPS). Once installed, it was just a matter of choosing the appropriate menu items and setting some parameters. Some of the parameters included the speed sensor settings and gear ratio. The speed settings were the most difficult. This was because in 1987 the speed sensor was in the tail housing of the transfer case. It’s a “hall effect” unit that transmits a set number of pulses per revolution. The ATC, while able to be configured for a transmission/transfer case sender, was very difficult to get dialed in because it took a lot of time to seek and find a numeric value that translated into a very close proximity of the actual speed of the truck. This was accomplished with a gps speedometer app to ensure the ATC understood the true speed the truck travels.
The shifting performance of this transmission is far superior to that of the C6 which was installed previously. I am very happy with how it turned out, even with having to contact tech support several times because the installation and configuration documentation left a lot to be desired.
