Hey Guys and Girls,

I've been reading the forum here since I got my truck last year and have learned a lot. Unfortunately, I'm now having an issue with my transmission and was wondering if anyone here had any ideas.

I have a early 1998 Dodge Ram 2500 Club Cab 12V Diesel with the 47RE. My transmission is acting up when it warms up. When cold, it seems to act fine. Once it is warmed up, the problem begins to arise and it gets worse until it gets up to temperature where the problem is severe.

The transmission will not go into first gear when at operating temperature when coning to a complete stop. The engine will rev like it is in neutral. When the issue begins, there seems to be problems with 1st and 2nd gear as it does a little searching. One it gets into 3rd, it is fine and locks up in 3rd (with O/D off) and shifts into 4th and locks (with O/D on). Even when the tranny is at operating temperature, if I can get the truck moving and finally get it into 3rd, it acts flawlessly.

The truck has 211,000 miles on it and I picked it up used at 201,000 miles. I have changed the fluid twice now. Once when I got it and again today (very little metal in fluid). I have adjusted the rear band as well as changed the governor solenoid and sensor. I haven't adjusted the front band as I ran out of daylight today, but something tells me that won't help.

I don't drive the truck everyday and I first noticed the issue last week. It seems to have gotten worse, as if I have to stop the truck when the tranny is at full operating temperature, there is a high probability I will not be able to get moving again. Again, if it does start to move, 3rd gear and on is perfect.

There is also no apparent "clunk" when shifting into drive from park or neutral. Reverse is acting fine and I get the nice "clunk" going into it from park or neutral. I get a very mild "clunk" into gear when the tranny is cold. Manually shifting into first does not seem to have any effect at all. I can manually shift through the gears when it is cold, but it will not go into first or second from a stop when it is up to temperature.

No check engine light is on and the transmission fuse and relay are good. The cables appear to be adjusted properly as there is no slack.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

Eric

 

one thing you might want to look at is inside the tranny pan on the passenger side is solenoid valve .here's a link http://dl.dropbox.com/u/42304/2001DodgeRam.pdf of the location of the solenoid page 1967 / 21-332 fig#19(5) shows the solenoid location .the 44re,46re,& 47re all have this solenoid.page 1967 /21-365 fig.#66(1) shows the solenoid and the screen that gets clogged(SOLENOID ON THE PASSENGER SIDE INSIDE THE PAN) THIS LITTLE SOLENOID GETS STOPPED UP AND CAUSES IT NOT TO SHIFT GEARS SO REMOVE AND CLEAN WITH BRAKE/PARTS CLEANER AND REINSTALL hope this helps

 

Thank you very much for the manual! I'm sure it will be very helpful for me in the future.

I replaced that solenoid and the sensor with new Mopar units from the dealer already and noticed no change in operation when it's all warmed up. I threw in the towel and brought it to a good tranny shop and I;m waiting to hear what they say after pressure testing.