I am hoping that someone can help me out with this. Last week I could not shift out of park. After hearing about this forum, I did some research and found that our shift interlock latch / park lockout - aka "pink thingy" was broken. I was kind of relieved to see that I was not alone with my problem but can't believe how many people have had this happen and safety issue or not, why Chrysler has not recalled it yet. Thanks to the many posts, I was able to find out where I could buy the replacement piece without being taken to the cleaners by the dealer and learned how to do the work myself. Everything went fine with the repair, BUT ... Now, unfortunately, my key is stuck in the ignition. It is fully functional and does turn to lock, however, it just won't allow me to remove it!!! Can anyone tell me how to resolve this??? Thanks in advance for any help.

***** UPDATE - MY MISTAKE, THE KEY DOES NOT TURN TO LOCK (OFF) AND WAS FULLY FUNCTIONAL, BUT NOW, THE BATTERY HAS COMPLETELY DIED and STILL CAN'T REMOVE THE KEY !! *******

 

The shift cable my not be properly adjusted. This will make the computer think the car was still in gear and not in park activating the locking mechanism on the ingnition key.

Workaround: If you pull the bezzel around the shilfter you should be able to get to the shift lock override. I believe it's on the passenger side. You can use that to override the shift lock and allow the key to be removed.

 

Just wanted to say thank you for your help. You were right, it turned out to be the shift cable. As soon as we removed the cable lock cap and moved the cylinder and cable just a hair, it allowed the key to turn to lock and we were finally able to get the key out. Now everything works great and we can get back on the road again without having to worry about the battery draining and needing to get jumped all the time.

BTW, Just in case anyone reading this comes across these same issues, I thought that I would mention a few other snags we came across after the install...

1) When we did a test drive, the transmission wouldn't get out of 3rd to shift into overdrive and the check engine light was on. Thanks to one of the other posts I read somewhere on here, there was something mentioned about the (#11) fuse = needing to remove it and re-insert it.... Well, that did the trick in fixing the light and the transmission problem.

2) The ESP / BAS light and the "swerving" car icon light stayed on ... Apparently because our battery got completely drained in the whole process of the key being stuck, and from us disconnecting it at one point, it caused these lights to come on. In order to get them to turn off, put the car in park, turn the wheel ALL the way to the left, then ALL the way to the right, turn the car off, then back on again ... these lights should now be OFF.

Thanks again, I am sure I will be back again for the next problem ... and good luck to those of you with any of these same problems in the future