Twice in the last year, I will leave the house and it will not shift from 2nd to 3rd.
I tried turning it off and restarting with no luck.
I looked through some forums and everything said bad tranny, except one little post said to try disconnecting and reconnecting the positive lead on the battery.

This worked. Shifts fine now.

Thing is, what could be the problem here?
It has the 3.8 engine.

 

Did the check engine lamp come on? Because you may have the 62TE transmission and could have gone into limp in mode or fail safe.

 

Did you notice any other concerns when this occurred? When is the last time it happened?

 

No, the CHECK ENGINE Light did not come on and the last time this happened before now what last February.

 

I have a 2008 Grand Caravan SXT 3.8 L V6 and I've owned it for a little over 2 years and it has had the same exact issue since about 6-months after I bought it. I took it to the dealership to have the issue addressed but they couldn't find a cause and offered no explanation as to how or why my vehicle could be doing this...so needless to say I'm a little frustrated and concerned that if left unaddressed the problem will only become more expensive to repair in the future. This is just one of MANY problems I've had with this vehicle but so far the only one I've not been able to fix. As far as removing the positive lead on the battery cable and reconnecting--I just replaced my battery a few months ago and that did not cause the problem to stop even temporarily so I don't think that's going to work in my case?? The issue is becoming more common as time goes on too--a year ago it would happen maybe once every few months or so--but in the past 6 months it's been occurring more like 1-2 times a week and shutting the engine off and restarting doesn't always work now...sometimes I have to try that 2-3 times before it shifts normally. If anyone has any experience with this I would be extremely grateful for your suggestions

 

Sorry for the delayed reply, miles44, but I was unable to find any potentially related TSBs. Has this occurred for you again yet?

Minx82, was the dealership able to duplicate this when you brought your vehicle in?