A4ld quits when hot...

[Canndspam]

So, ‘86 ranger, 2.9 2wd a4ld. After about an hour, hour and a half of driving, the transmission ceases to engage at all. Nothing, no fwd, rev, or otherwise. Once it cools down, it works again. I changed the fluid and filter to no effect. Is it time for a rebuild or or replacement or is there something else short of that that could work?

Some more back story, I got the truck 3 years ago and the guy said that his cousin had put a new tranny in it for him, but that ‘he hadn’t hooked the overdrive up right’. To get the truck to go, i have to shift to reverse, wait til it engages, then go strait to drive without stopping in od at all. If i do, the tranny disengages and no amount of shifting between gears will make it pop back in until you go back to park and start all over again. Now when driving, once im going over 45, i can shift to overdrive and it works as it should, but if i slow down to under about 35 or come to a stop, the tranny disengages and its back to park. Sometimes if im still rolling and i shift back to drive, it will clunk back into gear. Also when the tranny is disengaged it feels basically like neutral but it does have a slight amount of pull that will make the truck rock ever so slightly, and it has a higher whine to it than when in true neutral. This has been the case since ive had the truck and hasnt gotten better or worse, i just took it to be one of those fun little ‘personality quirks’. Anyhow, any advice would be much appreciated.

 

[RonD]

I think you already know the answer

Especially with the "back story"

Pull it, rebuild or replace, "he hadn’t hooked the overdrive up right" would lean me towards the replace since you don't what else "he" might have messed up or damaged.

Add trans cooler if you are going to tow with it.

 

[jhammel85]

The "new" trans was probably a junker when they got it from who knows where.

Sorry but it sounds like it's toast and probably was when you got it three years ago with all the weird issues.

 

[Canndspam]

yeah, these were all things i was figuring, but thought i would see if there was any chance of salvation before i really bit the bullet. all the weird issues considered though, i did get 50k odd miles out of that pos. and yeah, i do have a decent tranny cooler in there for some of the heavier times. quite probably what made it last as long as it has. off to peruse the a4ld rebuild threads...

 

[jhammel85]

There's a good one if you google "A4LD REBUILD" on the explorer forum. A very detailed rebuild thats well worth looking at.

 

[70roadrunner]

if it was rebuilt, it probably has an internal leak that has caused these problems. whenever you have a transmission problem, and are changing the trans, always put in a new torque converter. the converter traps a ton of crap and "time releases" into your new trans, ruining it