well had a big weekend planned with ice fishing derbys going on....was supposed to be out the today....but of course something has happened to my RAM and hopefully you guys can shed some light because i think she may be down for good...


I was comming off the highway, and it was running fine....turned off o/d then when i accelerated from the stop at the exit, it revved to about 4 grand then there was a pretty hard shift into second, and second just revved up would not shift into third, but with both gears theres was no slippage, still was driving strong....then i came to the next stop, which is about 1/4 mile from my house. when i took off she only had 1st gear, wouldnt shift....

I got home and checked my tranny fluid, it is still full, clean, and doesnt have any signs of a burnt smell....fluid/filter is about 5K miles old. reverse still works as it should, still goes into gear, 4x4 still works, hitting the o/d switch on and off still works (well the light still goes off and on when pushing button....) I dont know if this will make a difference, but the back of my truck is loaded with my 600 lb. snowmobile and about 300lbs of gear for fishing....needless to say truck has alot of extra weight...i havent driven it since in got it home when it wasnt comming out of first.

When i shift into reverse it goes smooth and can feel the torque converter locking it in as it should....only had that one hard shift then there was nothing..

And also maybe this can help identify my problem....

a few weeks ago i was having a problem when i couldnt push the gas pedal more then halfway down. would still go through all gears fine just couldnt push the pedal down all the way....i brought it to my buddy who works at a dodge dealership as a mechanic, and he messed around with my "kickdown cable" he was messing with it near the transmission, didnt touch the cables in engine bay, but he said the cable was binding, he was moving it by hand, and got it to free up, and ive had a normal gas pedal ever since....

now could my kickdown cable be broken? has this happened to anyone? would it cause my current problem? i havent checked myself because its very very windy and we are getting some snow right now, so its not the best time to be messing with my truck....

any help would be great, because if tranny is smoked, well then i guess Big Black is going to have to be retired, and since shes an organ donor all of her parts will go out to the other needy 2nd gen rams....but im hoping to avoid this....

 

since it all happened so suddenly, i'd start with a check/readjustment of the TV cable. there's a link here somewhere.

 

i still can't find the TV cable adjustment thread. maybe someone has it bookmarked.
https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...lve-cable.html


or band anchor.
https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...nsmission.html

 

ok thank you, ill look into that....

so with what i described does it sound like the tranny? if tranny was bad wouldnt i have a burnt smelling fluid? and like i said goes right into reverse no problems, and when it had only first and second both gears still had plenty of power with no slippage, and it was suddenly, this all took place within the course of 2 miles.....so it was very sudden

 

It may be possible that there is a problem without burned smell, but it has not been my experience. Look at TV cable, accel cable, and trans shift linkage.

 

Check tv cable bracket that holds cable in place. Isn't revving rpm's and then jerking into gear slipping? Anyway, one day I started having late shifts and found cable holder broke off from bracket. ATF-4 doesn't show burnt smell from heat like other types of trans fluid and is not a good indicator, can look good , but not be good. Don't think weight has anything to do with problem.

 

My experience with that is not the same.....on more than one occasion.



Smelled burned before it displayed any operational symptoms. Failure caused by heat from blocked fluid flow.

 

Doing this to your truck most likely did not help it one bit. Did you ever change that speed sensor so OD worked?