Hey guys, question. When im in drive and hit a bump my transmission pops out of drive and into neutral. Today it did it while trying to cross traffic and i almost got hit by oncoming cars! So since it almost caused me to get into an accident im going to tackle this soon as i get off work tomorrow. Problem is I dont know where to begin with this. I assume linkage but not sure. Reason im not sure is because there is a whole mess of issues going on in the steering column. Currently in the steering column i have to jiggle the key to get the radio and windshield wipers to turn on and if i adjust the trim on the steering wheel it will actually shut the engine off. As far as the gear selector i can freely move it from drive to neutral with applying roughly 3lbs of force directly upwards on the gear selector which im not sure if that is normal for rams or not. Trans was recently rebuilt btw (less than 50k miles). Also worth noting is its not a slip really it pops out of gear and i have to put it back into drive using the gear selector. The best way to describe it is its popping out of gear when you hit a bump over 10mph and will not go back into drive unless its put back into drive using gear selector.

Any help pointing me in the right direction will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

1998 Ram 1500
5.2L
4x4
automatic

 

How are your body mounts? I had an old Blazer that would do that.... the body mounts were so rusted, it would bounce around on the frame. A hard enough bump would literally pull the linkage out of gear.

 

Might also want to check the transmission shifter linkage and make sure the bushings aren't broken or missing.