Looking for some thoughts on this. I have two issues which I am hoping are related.

1) When converter locks up at approx 85-90k/hr I am getting a really violent vibration through the car for about 2 seconds. DUring this vibration it feels like there is a lack of power. I can also get it to this in 3rd gear lockup @ about 65k/hr but it isn't anywhere near as bad - bordering on barely noticable. I am guessing this is because there is not as much load.

2) When pulling in 1st gear from the lights, on the occasion it feels like the car gets "stuck" at about 1500-1600rpm. It doesn't feel like it is missing but is just struggling to increase revs until I give it a nice squeeze of the throttle to overcome it.

I should mention apart from this, when you have the boot in it the car runs great. Pulls to redline hard and smoothly shifts through all the gears.

From my limited mechanic knowledge I am thinking either blocked injector(s) not being able to keep up with the load and creating the illusion of a unbalanced(vibrating) engine as it would only be running on 6/7 cylinders, or a rooted torque converter (i hope not!! )?

Opinions and input would be much appreciated as to which way I tackle this newfound problem.

Everything you've mention points to a faulty T/C stator. but i could be wrong of course.

Have you had the full trans flush yet? that's one step of eliminating one from the other. try that first ASAP and if it still persist then it could be the T/C itself.

I'm afraid your probably right. I have decided it wouldn't be the injectors, but the only thing else I can think of is I will check that the balancer lines up at TDC.

I've booked it in to transmission place next Tuesday. He said if it is the converter, theres a very small chance changing the fluid will fix it if it's already playing up. He quoted $550 inc labour for the converter changeover if in his opinion it is the issue. May be abit extra if he has to remove my aftermarket headers to drop the gbox.

Does this sound like a fair price or am I being taken for a ride?

Buy a long spark plug lead so you can swap and test each cylinder individually during road test, just to be sure before parting with your cash. who knows, you might just need to flush the trans oil or even top it up.

BTW, that quote sound pretty reasonable but you might wanna compare it with another mob as well.

OK - not the gearbox. I had it looked over and it needed a few things doing (external cooler, flush, reco converter, 2 & 4th gear had been slipping abit) as the previous owner poorly maintained it, however the particular issue here remains.

It will only do it once the car is at operating temperature. I have checked the Balancer and it lines up with TDC. I have disconnected the MAF and it ran like crap without it so it's not the MAF. Won't be the tailshaft because it is rpm related and not speed related. I am down on power during the couple of seconds of the vibrations so if it's not the gbox it's something with the engine.

I am going to put my old leads and coil packs in and see how that goes, along with new oxy sensors and working 2nd hand TPS but I need some more ideas. Would starvation or over fuelling cause something like this? Any sensors that may cause this?