Alright, so I did a little brainstorming on the matter. Dunno if I'm on to something here or not? Need to pose this question and bounce it off of you guys.I hope to get my exhaust brake here soon and thinking on the issue more, considering I have an auto, it makes some sense. I have not been able to tell if my transmission does a 2nd gear lock up or not. But if not, I think I may have a good idea for a workaround.IIRC, a lock-up switch will allow you to lock the TC at ANY time, right? Well if so, would this work:- EB kicks in at 3rd or 4th but then the truck slows down enough to the point that it shifts to 2nd. EB kicks off as the trans does not have 2nd gear lockup.So my thought to remedy this is that when this occurs, shift the transmission to 2nd gear with lever on the steering column. Then, hit the lock-up switch and lock the TC. Now, the EB should kick back on, or hit the switch to kick the eb on?Not sure how the EB controller will react to this, but if this is a possibilty, sure sounds worth it!

I had this talk with my trans guy a while ago, and he said the only way to achieve 2nd gear lock up was to modify the valve body. He also advised against it in my case because I don't have billet shafts. According to him 2nd gear lock up is hard on a trans without the proper hard parts

Auto's typically only get 3rd and 4th gears for Exhaust brake function. Lets say my exhaust brake has the potential of actually locking up the rear tires in into a hopping skid. So I would have to agree with him...

Well, I guess it was a thought... Dunno why 2nd gear would be any more diff. than other gears?Don't understand what your meaning, Mike...

I don't have an EB so I am not speaking from experience but just thinking about it. When you are pulling something heavy and want to use your EB to slow you down it has to work against the load you are trying to slow down and the velocity from which you are trying to slow it down from.As you may know the transmission mutiplies the torque output of the engine and has to be strong enough to handle the output torque of the engine.So when you are trying to use the EB to slow down your truck with it's load, the transmission has to be able to handle the reverse torque of the load you're carrying and the speed from which you are trying to slow down from. As you go down in the gears (and up in the gear ratio) you are multiplying the slow down torque that the transmission has to handle in the lower gears. This reverse load may exceed the capabilty of some of the key transmission parts and break them. I think that is why transmission recommendations include recommendations on using billet input shafts and someties other key parts depending on the torque requirement the transmission may be required to handle.

manual override on EB, and pull selector to 2ndThat's what I did in my '96, until I did the 4500 swap..

I did my own valve body mod for second gear lock with a dab of JB weld. Now I can brake down to about 10 mph. As far as needing billet parts my feeling is I'm ok without them as long as I drive the truck myself and do it respectfully.

  volkswagon said:

I did my own valve body mod for second gear lock with a dab of JB weld. Now I can brake down to about 10 mph. As far as needing billet parts my feeling is I'm ok without them as long as I drive the truck myself and do it respectfully.

Care to share the process? Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

  Rogan said:

Care to share the process? Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

Please share this info!

Hey, looks like we might be on to something here!

Sorry I didn't notice your posts sooner. I'll find the info and post it up.

Here you go guys. I hope the link posts. http://www.cumminsforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=573451