Hello all! I was in the process of cleaning my drums, and shoes, the drums were giving me difficulty removing, so I took them off by shifting it to “D” and letting them spin off, it worked. I completely forgot the axle with the drum off kept spinning despite applying the brakes, as I shift to (P) a loud ratcheting noise was heard. My question is, how does the park pawl work, did I damage my transmission? It wasn’t going at high speed. Thank you.

 

Park on an incline where it rolls on it's own. Put it in park. If it stays put, it's fine. If it rolls away you broke the parking pawl. Chances are pretty good it survived. It's just a square end on a steel arm that drops in matching spots on a gear. The ratcheting you heard was the pawl skipping over the gear.