AOD won't shift after driving in rain

TbirdSCFan

Registered User
I'm not sure what happened, but after driving through quite a bit of standing water, my AOD got stuck in 1st. The next day, I drove it around for a few miles and same thing.. wouldn't shift out of 1st. After about 2-3 miles, it finally kicked into 2nd. After another 10 minutes, 3rd and eventually OD. I drove it the rest of the day.
That evening, same thing.. stuck in 1st.. couple of miles finally found 2nd, 3rd and after about 5 miles O/D. It didn't hunt out of O/D, but still didn't really upshift right. Upshifts are very late and much firmer.

Any ideas as to what may have caused this? TV cabe knocked loose? Water in the tranny from the dipstick tube? Water in from past the seals?

I'm thinking this may be it.. time for the rebuild. Someone recently posted a link to one of the chapters where someone had a lot of pics on the process. Anyone remember where that was?
 
Check the tv cable & linkage and make sure it slides freely and its not stuck forward.
My tranny shifted real hard and late because someone adjusted the tv cable too tight and it jammed the linkage.......tranny thinks your foot is on the floor all the time :eek:
 
Yup. did that from the throttle and from under the car. Everything seems fine. I plan to drain it today to see what comes out.

OK... Out came tranny fluid mostly redish with a bit of brown. Didn't smell bad and no crumbs of metal in the pan. Some small metal flakes were in the fluid after it settled in the drain pan but thats it.. not water, no goopy mixture of crud.. there was however a thin very fine blackish film on the bottom of the pan but hardly noticable unless you ran your finger through it. I'm a bit stumped.. I expected to see something amiss.
 
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You could try and retorque the valvebody bolts. There is a particular sequence that you have to go by, and you need an inch lb torque wrench.

Jerry
 
:confused: Took off the pan to inspect things.. installed a new filter and gasket.. ran the relatively clean old fluid through a filter and poured it back in. No sense spending $ if it were going to need a rebuild anyways. :D Now, it seems to working just fine. Go figure. :confused: Think I'm going to overhaul the valve body.
 
I'm a little confused myself. Did you change the fluid out with new and then redrop the pan? Mercon III is only like $1.75 a quart so $20 replaces it all. Don't try and save $20 when it may cost hundreds to rebuild the transmission. The fluid has additives that get used up over time and heat. Even if you filter it the slip rates of the fluid will have changed. I would drain the convertor as well as the pan. Get all the old fluid out you can.

If you suspect the valvebody you could buy a valvebody from Art Carr, Lentech, or Performance Automatics and just swap valvebodies. Then if you still need a rebuild down the road you would already have a good performance valvebody. Having said all this, if the fluid is as clean as you say it's probably not the valvebody gummed up. New clean fluid may clean it up anyway. Try to get all new fresh fluid in the transmission and see how it goes.



Jerry
 
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