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I have the stupidest question. When I bought my truck the dipstick didn’t stay snapped down. I just assumed the “cup” part near the top had an issue. I was in the junkyard for something else, and I figured I would grab a dipstick and try it. The new one snapped in place fine, but it turns out that the old one was bottoming out, it didn’t have an issue with the cup on top. So, anyway, my question is, how long SHOULD my trans dipstick be? Old one measures 37”, new one measures 34”. Obviously I want to be able to make sure I have the right ATF level.
i have exactly same thing, have read cut about 3/8" off the end. i have not had the pan off yet and not sure where the hot mark is when the dipstick is seated properly.
i see this is old thread but hope you haven't been using that shorter one. looks way to short there is a way to mark your dipstick with the pan off can't remember though how high above the pan line it is suppose to be.
hoping someone can confirm or not whether or not clipping the end is a good solution.
Well, obviously your dipstick shouldn't be bottoming out, so I'd assume you had the wrong one to begin with. I have the 545RFE transmission and my dipstick end looks like the bottom one in your first pic.
Damn, Dodge hasn't fixed that yet!!! They've had that problem since the GenIII's were first releeased. What you need to do, is pull the dipstick out, trim about 3/8 in off the bottom of the dipstick, and stick it back in!! Will seat just fine. Did that to mine and no problems since.
2001 Dakota 4.7 auto trans dipstick length
