If a gummed up governor is the problem, rather than increased pressure, I'd say it's the detergent qualities of the new fluid that stirred up sludge that had settled before. And even then I'd only expect that to happen if the fluid had never been changed before or it had been a really long time.

I'm still thinking it's in limp mode due to the code. In limp mode there is no first gear just like you describe.

If you want to know for sure if it's a gummed up governor, pull the battery cable for a couple of hours so the code clears, and the tranny should still messed up from the get-go. If the tranny works OK for a while, I'd question the governor pressure theory.

 

Since you say you have a lot of sludge and gummy crap your pan, you might want to check your check valve on your pressure line. It's that big brass fitting in the hard line on the fram that goes in the bottom fitting of your cooler.

When those get plugged you can have all kinds of issues, but I'll stick with the electricals as the original problem. Changing them eliminated a host of tranny issues as well as a couple of trouble codes for me.

 

OK, we will try disconnecting the batt. to see if it is a set problem.We'll also check the check valve as you said. It would seem to be intermittent, so diagnosing it is a little sketchy. Also about clearing the code, couldn't we just use a scanner to get in there and clear it out rather than waiting several hours? I have an OBD II Actron scanner, so we'll give it a shot.