This story begins two months ago when I bought the truck. Transmission was absolutely ****ed, the overdrive housing was cracked and the transfer case was being held on by two bolts. Transmission wouldn’t shift past 3rd in 2HI and slipped a lot and would sometimes pop out of 2Hi into neutral. In 4Low it would shift fine. No problem it needs a new transmission anyway and I have a transfer case for it kicking around. I spent a day changing out the transmission and transfer case. It still does the same thing but this time it only shifts at 3100rpm, so I pull the transmission and get a dodge tech to tear it apart. Everything looks brand new. So maybe I missed something, maybe the fluid level was too low. I put it back in. This time it stalls when I try to put it into gear so I can’t even test drive it. So I’m thinking the torque converter is shot and is locking up prematurely. Transmission back out, new converter in. This time I can shift into gear without stalling. Still feels like it’s slipping in 2hi and I notice something almost like a grinding noise (I’m assuming it’s the transfer case as the trans and torque converter are both new). The grinding noise and slipping only happens in 2hi and it still won’t shift past 3rd. In 4low it shifts through all the gears but only at 3100rpm. Now at this point I don’t know what to do, I swapped pretty much the entire drive train but I still have the same problem, just worse than it was before hand. I’m at a complete loss here so any ideas would really help. Thanks in advance.

 

First thing I would look at would be the TV cable. Make sure it moves freely, and is adjusted properly. Second would be fluid level. You have to check the level in Neutral. Park will give an artificially high reading.

Next thing I would look at, if you are having trouble keeping the engine running still, is the crank sensor. Given the number of times the trans has bee out/in, I can't think it took real kindly to that experience.

Check those, see what's up.

 

Fluid level was checked in neutral. Tv cable has been adjusted. It has a brand new crank sensor as of yesterday. None of these did anything to help. Well the crank sensor kinda helped it idle a little better but the shifting hasn’t changed.

 

What brand crank sensor?

Which electronics are in the trans? Were they replaced?

 

Not sure by what you mean by electronics, I am by no means a transmission expert (that’s why I sent it away to have it taken apart lol). Can’t remember the brand of crank sensor off the top of my head but I’m pretty sure it’s performing the way it should. The only thing that was replaced in the trans was the valve body. Is it possible for the linkage for the transfer case to be mid aligned and cause it to slip/grind?

 

So you are saying you put it in 4low and got it to shift into 4th? If so you damaged something because you are not to exceed 25mph in 4low

 

I thought it was more along the lines of you can't exceed 25mph, simply because of the gearing..... the engine would be screaming at 25mph.

That said, on the 97, the PCM doesn't know anything about what range the t-case is in, although, I would think it could figure it out by looking at the output speed sensor on the trans, and the wheel speed sensor on the rear axle......

Check engine lite on? How about the trans temp light? O/D Off?

 

After replacing the torque converter the trans temp light hasn’t come on yet, the o/d off button used to come on before too but hasn’t since either. It’s only throwing a code for o2 sensors (the guy before me took the cat out)

 

Does the speedo work? Was the pressure sensor and shift solenoid relapsed? I would do a pressure test on the trans and see what's going on.

 

Okay so I just had an idea pop into my head. When I swapped the transfer case I noticed it didn’t have a speed sensor on it. I did a little bit of digging and found out it was more than likely from a 1998-2001 ram (correct me if I’m wrong). I just barley did a bit more thorough research and found out the shift pattern was different. 1997 had 2hi at the top followed by 4hi neutral and 4low. The 1998-2001 had 4low at the top followed by neutral 2hi and 4low. I’m assuming this would affect my shift pattern and make it 4 low where 2 hi would be, neutral where 4 high would be, neutral would be 2hi and 4 low would be 4hi. Again correct me if I’m wrong but is four low now where 2hi used to be for the old transfer case? That would seem to answer all of the “problems” I’m having and might even explain the grinding noise I’m hearing (over speeding transfer case?).