od light blinking

[jeffw920]

hey, i was wondering if anyone could help me understand a little problem i had with the truck yesterday...

here's what happened:
got on the highway, accelerated at a pretty good rate to about 70, no problems, after about 2 min of cruising traffic came to a halt and everyone slammed on their brakes. I hit the brakes pretty hard but did not feel the abs go off, whether i locked up the rears idk but it is entirely possible. once traffic cleared and i accelerated again (pretty hard but not wot) my od off light began to blink and i lost 5th gear. I pulled over cycled through all gear selections and checked tranny fluid. my level seemed a bit high, about 1-1.5 inches over the crosshatched area. according to the previous owner fluid was last changed 40k ago, the fluid is blood red looks brand new and smells fine. after shutting the truck off and starting it back up it seems to run fine. Anyone experience anythign like this?

I've read that the abs sensor on the rear diff can cause the tranny to act funny when it goes bad. could someone explain the connection between the two to me? I'm hoping that would be the cause of this little issue. Again this only happened once, truck operates fine now but fluid does seem a little high (it was checked hot, but manual says to check it hot).
Should i go get it flushed, or drop the pan and check for anything obvious?
thanks for any input,
-Jeff

oh and specs on the truck to help out:
2004 fx4 4.0sohc, 5r55e

 

[baddis]

take it somewhere and have the transmission codes pulled.

 

[jeffw920]

I have a code reader and it said "no powetrain dtcs present" when i checked after i got home. Is there a separate thing used to check tranny codes? sorry I don't know

 

[Muscleford]

My old 08 had a blinking OD light and the dealer replaced under warranty, three days old, the trans range sensor. The blinking light is a trans issue. Not sure what you need to read the code though.

 

[whatelseisleft]

blinking od light means bad things... it's most likely gonna be something internal... whats the mileage on your truck??? take it to a reputable trans shop and have them take a look at it...

 

[jeffw920]

only 69,000miles. I'm gonna probably just bring it in to get it flushed and hope it doesnt happen again. If it happens again i will start to go deeper but i've been doing quite a bit of driving sense then and it appears to be an isolated incident

 

[exbass94]

Only the better/more expensive code readers can read transmission codes.

 

[jeffw920]

ok so it's a p0735 "gear 5 ratio error"

I had a brief conversation with the local transmission guy today. He said there's a possibility that it is an internal solenoid pack but they would have to try to recreate the incident. If they can't recreate it, they wont know. He also said that when the solenoid goes it typically takes longer to shift into gear, which i don't have a problem with, mine clicks into gear with little hesitation.
Still hoping it's just a freak occurrence, but anyway I am dropping it off tomorrow to see if they can better diagnose it, and it will get a fluid and filter change regardless since its been a while.

thanks for the comments