I was wondering if you take the 6 speed automatic out of the new malibus with the 2.4 ecotecs and replace the the 4 speed in my car. Just wondering if it would even be possible. I have a 07 2.2 auto w/sport package. Any info would be cool. thanks.

 

I'm going to venture to say theres no way it will bolt up...

 

Bolting up wont be the problem, Fab trans mounts and your fine. The hard **** is tuning it. You would probably need the wiring harness, PCM,ECM and other little **** from the Malibu to make it work.

 

thanks for the imput so far also do you think i would get any gains in perfomance and or mpg?

 

the 6 speed will bolt up, you would need to fab mounts and figure axles out. thats the easy part.

controlling it is a pain. the transmission uses a tcm thats built into the valvebody, and the transmission has only a few wires going into it, 12v +, ground and 2 can bus data wires. to get the tcm to function is has to be able to communicate with all the other computers in the vehicle through can bus. basicly, there is no way to do that, unless your a computer geneous and can write your own coding for everything.

 

But what if you got the wiring harness and all electronics it should run like that, you probably wont have the inside ammenities unless you swap all them over to malibu stuff...

 

thing is everything in the new vehicles is can bus communications, all the modules need to communicate with each other, if one is missing it throws everything off. in order to make it work you would need every peice of wiring and every single module from the malibu.

 

i remember discussing this in depth with you, but i cant remember. what was the issue with the earlier CAN bus ECMs used on the 2.2? just no physical connector to connect the TCM to the TCM in the valvebody?

 

with the 4t45e, the tcm is actualy part of the pcm, and its a simple system- input and output speed sensors, 2 shift solonoids, a lockup solonoid and an epc solonoid. the 6 speed uses a seperate tcm inside the tranny. its not that the tcm cant be hooked into the ecm, im sure the pins are there for it, however the ecm doesnt and tcm dont know how to communicate with each other. its not a simple reflash or something hpt can take care of, its the core programming.

mabey a better way to think of it is trying to network a group of pc's and share a bunch of files. if you dont tell each computer what computers are connected and what files to share, its not going to work.

 

Hmm, this seemed like an interesting enough topic for a first post...

So the biggest problem I see is the vehicle architecture. The Malibu was redesigned in 2008 and placed on the new "Epsilon" platform, while the Cobalt is built on the "Delta" platform. Platform is the word GM uses to group all of the major systems together (engines, transmissions, electrical). The Malibu is in a whole new category than the Cobalt, mostly because its newer - but also because it represents a whole new chapter in GM's approach to designing and building cars. Seriously, if you haven't looked at one - go by a Chevy dealer and ask for a test-drive, its an awesome car. I know, I know, its a Cobalt forum, so I digress...

Anyway - there are 3 transmissions available on the Malibu. The 4-cylinder malibus can be built with either the 4T45 (order code MN5) or the 6T40 (order code MH8). Interestingly, the 4T45's that are in the cobalt have a different order code (MX0). Again, this is because of the differences in architecture. The Malibu is a newer vehicle, and has more technology as a result. Even though they share the same basic 4-speed, how that 4-speed is controlled is a different story.

Even more interesting to note is that there are actually 2 different 6-speeds available for the Malibu. If the car is built with a 4-cylinder and a 6-speed, you get the 6T40, but if it is put in a 6-cylinder, they use a 6T70 (heavier duty - built for the massive torque the little V-6 makes!)

Needless to say, there's more to this story that simply getting it to fit - the brains of the Cobalt aren't designed to control it, and I doubt anyone with the know how to reverse engineer the whole control protocol and then build a new controller is willing to put the time into it (certainly not without a LOT of money). As I would imagine the goal of this excercise would be to save money on gas, a nobel enough cause, one would have to plan on saving a lot gas to offset the cost of such a project.

Good news for you and me, though, is that the good folks at GM have already been working on this puzzle, and have a solution due out in the 2011 year model called the Cruze! Assuming the government doesn't strongarm GM in to building only some super-efficent, anemically-underpowered version of the car that nobody wants to buy, <sarchasm>you know we should all be thinking greener these days! </sarchasm> I think it will be a great car. Details are still soft on the engines available in the US.

Thank you to anyone who took the time to ready my thoughts, I really didn't set out to write a novel, it just kinda happened...

 

Thanks for the thoughts I really did not think it would be possible. I have done all kinds of reading on the Cruze it seems nice and looked really good at the autoshow that i went to. The only problem I see with the Cruze is i dont think they are going to do an ss form, but we can wish. Also the malibu is sweet and i have driven one. Once again thanks for the imput.

 

actualy the only real difference in the 4t45e in the malibu is going to be the final drive ratio because its a larger, heavier car. the technology is all the same as far as the transmission itself goes, hasnt changed much since it came out as the 4t40e in 1995. pcm control strategy has changed through the years going from map/tps based control to engine torque based strategy.

 

that would be sweet. my dad has a Chevy Traverse. 6 speed auto. it'll do 80 mph on the freeway at right under 2,000 rpm.