Reverant, I have been making small tweaks to my transmission settings in HPT for a few months now, slowly learning by small adjustments at a time. It's actually been very rewarding. If you have a model with a performance shift button, like I do, you can have your "normal" shift table very mild, upshift earlier etc. for better gas mileage, and use the "performance" table for high-rpm shifts. We should compare notes at some point, I've still got much to learn myself.
I have had good luck making shifts more concise by decreasing the "shift time" and leaving the shift pressure alone. It gives me that nice snappy feel without the "bucking" effect.
Also, when raising (up)shift points, I try to make sure they are at least 300rpm below the rev limit. What I've found is that as the revs jump up a tad during an upshift, the car would actually cut fuel during the upshift, not good.
As far as shift times/pressures/rpm/mph goes, what I like to do is take whole tables and multiply by a reasonable percentage. For example, if I want to lower shift times, I multiply the whole table by .95 . If I want more, than I do the same thing again. I did the same thing with the torque abuse tables.
Also, I try to adjust my torque converter lock up tables in a similar manner. I try to increase the torque lockup speed along with my upshift speed, basically trying to keep a few mph between upshifting and locking the converter.
These are just my personal preferences, someone more experienced might chime in that these are not good practices. At 251k miles and original engine and tranny, I don't push it terribly hard, but have had good luck. I keep the trans in good shape with semi-frequent fluid and filter changes, and I haven't had a problem with slipping yet. The only time I've had a slipping issue is when I had the radiator out to change the condenser, which caused my trans fluid to be a bit low until I topped it off.
