wigg

A while ago my wife was driving my truck and called me to tell me the truck would not go into reverse or neutral, but drive worked. So she drove over the curb and managed to drive it home that night. when she put it in neutral, it acted like it was in drive..so like

Neutral was drive
Drive was 2
1 was 2... If that makes sense...

After she got it home, i couldn't figure out the problem so i just continued to drive it around town locally, as long as i didn't need to reverse, i was ok. So the other night, i was driving home and heard a clunk. i pulled over to the side...sat there..I figured the transmission just took a dump. So Then I tried reverse. And now reverse worked!!

But for like 6 months, reverse never worked...then all of a sudden, now reverse works and drive doesn't. So I drove it home at 3am in reverse to my house.

I'm so confused. I thought maybe the transmission was broken in drive and thats why reverse never worked. But now that reverse works, and drive doesn't, makes me think it's something else. Any help on this would be great.

is there some kind of linkage that i should check or something that needs adjustment? cause im thinking that that transmission gears seem to be working since both drive and reverse do work, just not when you want them.

its a f150 2002 4x2 automatic transmission. any help would be appropriated.

zap

Have you checked the linkage? I can't help much cause I have a standard but a buddy of mine has an auto version of mine and his is off gears ie D is 2, 2 is 1, 1 is in no man's land. We think it's the linkage, so that's why I suggest checking the linkage. If you can, check all of it from the column to the physical lever on the tranny.

benjigiff1352

mine shows the same way. D is 2 and whatnot, but i just figured the orange pin from the shifter was off, is this a bigger problem then?

zap

benjigiff1352, I'm pretty sure its just an issue with where the linkage meets the column mechanism. Column shifters traditionally have issues, that's one of the main reason you stopped seeing 3 and 4 on the tree back in the early 70's. Only takes a slip on the auto's column shifter to throw things off. More serious things I would think would be related to the mechanism as well as the linkage an actual lever on the tranny. Least that's my reasoning behind it. Like I said, I have a 5 on the floor and the 3 on the tree went out of style in the US long before I was born (I think Renualt has a few models with 4 and 5 on the tree) so I have to logically reason with what I know.

wigg

so i tighened the 2 bolts under the dash. im assuming that these are the 2 bolts im supposed to tighten.

how much play is supposed to be in the whole assembly? seems like the bolts are tight but when i wiggle the shift arm on the dash/console...from underneath i can see the whole assembly move around. is this normal to have play? or is this loose somewhere else?

thanks

wigg

this is where the cable attaches to the transmission. am i supposed to look for something here maybe?