Ok Dodge boys, I have a friend with a 97 Ram 1500. We changed the spark plugs and wires and did an oil change the other day and it ran fine. He left my house, drove about 6 miles to the interstate then the tranny started slipping. He kept driving for about 30 more miles because he had to get to work. By the time he got there the truck would only go about 10 mph and barely pull itself. I took my trailer to get the truck and bring it back home. When I got there the first thing I did was check the fluid, it looked nice and red but was over the full mark (engine running, tranny cold in neutral). I crawled under and found a 3 prong connector disconnected, located on the driver side, behind the linkage, just above the pan. (see attached pic) I reconnected it but nothing changed. The truck will barely go forward and barely go in reverse. You have to put it in gear and press on the gas and it'll start moving around 3000 rpm, but like I said, it barely goes. I've searched the forum and found several posts about tranny issues (check valve, converter problems, etc.) but I'm wondering if driving with the forementioned connector disconnected could have caused the tranny to mess up. It shifted fine before we did the maintenance. Any thoughts or suggestions of things we need to do or check? We're going to drop the pan tomorrow and see what's inside, probably do a filter change and what else??? Thanks for any help or advice, I'm a Chevy guy and this is the first Dodge I've tinkered on.

 

Try resting PCM for the hell of it. And get rid of the overfill.

 

That's the neutral safety switch. It may confuse things a bit, but, shouldn't damage the trans being unplugged while driving.

Shortly behind that one is an 8 pin connector. Disconnect that one, and take the truck for a test drive. Keep in mind, you will have ZERO automatic functions, it will stay in whatever gear you put it in, regardless of what else is going on. So, start in first, and manually shift thru the gears. (may not get TCC engage, so, don't go real far like that.)

If the trans does what you tell it to, when you tell it to, and doesn't slip, or anything else odd or strange, drop the pan, replace the governor pressure sensor and solenoid.

 

Thanks for the info, I'll try to disconnect the 8-pin connector. Just to be sure, it's above and to the right of the neutral safety switch, at the 1-2 o'clock position in the pic...right?

 

yes sir it is.


and clean the area first.

 

Ok, I cleaned the area around the 8-pin connector, disconnected it, started the truck, put it in 1st and no change. It revs up to about 3500 before the truck starts to move. I tried it in each forward gear and reverse with the same results. I guess my next step would be to drop the pan and see what's inside, right? The fluid on the dipstick still looks red, not dark or burnt smelling. I'm wondering if I could have knocked a vacuum line off or some connector loose or something like that when I put the new plug wires on. There's a lot of stuff back there by the distributor and like I said, I'm a Chevy guy so tinkering on a Dodge is new territory for me. Thanks again for all your help and advice.

 

Dropping the pan to inspect what's in there is next. Maybe adjust the bands too. Nothing to lose at this point. And there is no vacuum to the tranny. Clean the governor solenoid too.

 

Thanks Zman, I'll have to do some research to figure out how to adjust the bands and exactly where the governor solenoid is so I can clean it. It just seems to me that it's not pumping the fluid through the tranny like it should because the fluid level wasn't above the full mark before this happened and now it is, or maybe the torque convertor a'int working right. I'll try your suggested steps, inspect and or replace the filter, fill it up with new fluid and see what happens. I think I read somewhere that it takes 4 qts of ATF plus fluid when you do a filter change, is that right?

 

Go to the FAQ section and look through the threads. The is an FSM download (on the first page)and tranny threads that have pics. And atleast 4qt's. Get more .

 

LOL....I'm downloading the FSM as we speak....or type....and I'll keep looking for the other threads with pics. I'll get extra fluid, just in case