HEY I am a college student who recently acquired a 98 1500 d ram quad cab SLT laramie. 4x4 - around 170k mile.

It ran good engine wise for the month I have owned it but I noticed between 35-40 mph the tranny would shift down a gear for no reason causing high RPM and then go bk to normal randomly (and repeating this behavior randomly while in this 34-40 range) . so I just avoided this speed range much as i could n ignored it. was told that it was a bad solenoid from people i got truck from.

I didnt notice any other major issues.

Anyway- to get to my problem- I was going on a road trip and started driving - pulled into a store up a little hill- and completely lost all ability for the transmission to make the truck go forward- stepping on the gas just make RPMS go insane (while in drive) n the truck actually started to roll backwards!
I just held the brake- tried putting it every single combination of gear - even with 2 or 4x4 wheels and it wouldnt move at all, tranny doesnt seem to work for any gear- reverse included.

A strange thing tho if I let it sit for awile and it cools off and I start it up I AM able to go forward in Drive- until pretty quickly after it quickly begins to loose ability to move the truck (I seem to be able to reproduce this ).

Currently its sitting in my drive way all ***ed up.

I am on a college budget so any tips or help is appreciated! I got a week to fix it before class starts.

Thx!

 

buy yourself a little 500$ beater and park the old goat.

 

Check fluid in neutral, check level, color, and smell

 

you need a new transmission, or get urs rebuilt. lookng arround 1,500-2,000 for a rebuild. id say get a junker and park the dodge!

 

If I were you I'd buy an old car like the rest are saying, plus it would get wayy better gas mileage haha

 

man y'all a bunch of turn coats.. dang regular Benedict Arnold's.. Maybe even as bad as the french during Blitzkrieg..




check your fluid dude.. as was mentioned.. sounds like you starved that rascal of fluid or overheated it.. or the PO ran something in it other than at+4 to get it sold.. or, God help you, put some sort of additive in it to get it sold..

have you had the thing off-road lately? Have you forded any water? Could you have smacked your pan real good? Is your check valve still present? Have you checked to see if you bumped the TC into neutral by accident? Was it making sounds when you put it in gear first thing in the morning that sounded like it was straining?

You can get a tranny built for under a grand, but then you have a band-aid build that you will be working again.. you can drop $1200~$1500 and get an OEM spec rebuild that will last you upwards of 150k if you treat it well, or you can get a solid tranny that addresses all the known issues for around $2200~$3500 and never worry about your tranny again..

You're caught between a rock and a hard place.. You can fix it for the cost of a gas sippin' beater, and try to sell whats left of it (nobodies going to touch it with a bad tranny, and a second gen it will be one of the first questions asked)... or you can fix it and sell it as a fresh rebuilt tranny which will help you selling it- but the rest of it better be in good condition.. Or you can park it, bu a beater, and come back later to it when your money is in better order..

You're kinda screwed in other words..

it may be something fairly simple though- and it may not be that you've gutted the tranny unless you starved it for too long..

 

Might just be the torque converter clutch is going/gone. if that is the case, a new torque converter and some fluid will fix it.

 

I'm lost... how can that cause a total loss of viscous coupling? I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't understand it. Care to enlighten me?

 

If the torque converter clutch is gone he will only lose lockup. Then all the black friction material gets flushed through your tranny and torque converter a destroys it. The TCC is what originally went in my tranny. I had a good sized pile of friction material and metal shavings in the pan and had the enjoyment of cleaning that black sludge out of every nook and cranny in this tranny when I rebuilt it. My truck still drove when I pulled the tranny, it just wouldn't move until about 1500 rpm at which point if would slam into gear.

 

Oops, I didn't read thread carefully enough. I just scanned and saw the part where he was complaining about slippage from 35-40 mph, which is around lock up in third gear.

Sorry dude, didn't mean to get your hopes up.