BUY ADVICE, DEAL/NO DEAL? Hard Shift 1 to 2, 2 to 3

[Jay11]

Looking at a plain jane 1996 Ranger for light practical purposes-homedepot runs, occasional what not.
4.0L Automatic
103k miles
Owned by an octogenarian & serviced on time. It's pretty clean, shows no sign of abuse.

My major concern:
Trany is overfilled and has a wet spot ... may be a 5-6 inch wide area after being parked for 6 hours.

Truck has the get-go and responds. During test drive it has a slightly hard shift from 1-2, 2-3 then it's smooth as butter thereafter. When driving like an octogenarian this is not very apparent. But when you take it through the paces while hitting the highway or just a get up go yeah it's there (I wasn't aware to look at the tachometer behavior at the time.)

The other was a serpentine belt noise, happens at cranking when had been sitting for 6 hours but stops right after engine is running. After it warmed up there's no more belt noise with cranking. My wing man (long time p/up owner) said it's pro'ly loose somewhere, owners son thought it's may be a tad bit tight.

I diy my Camry and wife's C240, but know zilch about Fords. I have been reading up about this truck's trany and I don't know what to make of this, and the belt noise issue.

Is this trans at the onset of a known, impending trany problem and I will be better off walking? Or is this something that can be addressed at reasonable cost and not like a grand or two? We agreed on $1800 and I am not a fan of dropping big $$ on tranys so any input from ranger heads will be helpful in deciding on this deal.

 

[txgocartB3000#2]

Sorry I have limited knowledge on trannys but I’m sure it being overfilled is not good.

I do have a question that you do not have to answer...

If you have agreed with the seller that you are to purchase at a set price why are you asking if you should buy it.

To me a more reasonable question would be if you had made a good decision or not.

Maybe I am seeing more of a simple transaction than is necessary.

Ray

 

[rusty ol ranger]

Ill bet draining the fluid to the proper level would take care of that hard shift. The A4LD is a notorious POS however and the damage may be done.

Personally id chance it.

 

[Jay11]

Fair questions.
The deal is not yet done but will be completed on Tuesday. I have option to cancel before then. Thus, my reading up on test drive observations and posting above.

 

[hank857]

The trans if leaking may have the bad shift rail plugs (plastic that eventually leak), and may have a bad mainshaft causing the shift issue. I bought one that was similar with trans problem. Cost about 900$ to have it rebuilt for the mainshaft and bearings. They also installed the steel shift rail plugs. Cost another 2-300$ for new clutch, slave cyl, master cyl and I did all the removal and install. I do now have a shop that is reasonable and has base rate of $200 with additional for other parts in same repair.

My 94 has over 300000 miles on it and the trans has been the main problem. After R&R the initial the OD went out and that was another 5-600$ (i pulled and installed trans), got to using the autozone clutch kits and lifetime master and slave and have had to pull 1 more time as I thought it had leaking rear main (was leaking valve cover and valley cover) but was seeping straight down to trans! So while out they gave me new stuff (no questions asked), I also got a new flywheel done work came to about $400 for the trans and a another 2-300 for other stuff I had done.

So with all this the truck will cost at least $1000 to fix trans so bargen him down as much as possible to cover the repair. To be sure find a good indy repair shop and ask for guesstimate for the work, use autozone or source of choice for parts ( I tried named brand initially, not much to brag about except the high price and no long warranty)

 

[adsm08]

Automatic

This would be enough for me to move to the next ad.

 

[adsm08]

Ill bet draining the fluid to the proper level would take care of that hard shift. The A4LD is a notorious POS however and the damage may be done.

Personally id chance it.

That's not an A4LD, its a 4R55, which is the same design, but better.

 

[Uncle Gump]

If it's clean (no Rust?)... not abused... 100K on the clock... well maintained. I would probably own it.

I think the truck if it stays un abused and maintained... It will go another 200K. If the trans lets go in the future... have it repaired

 

[txgocartB3000#2]

@Jay11 my apologies.

I misunderstood your intentions.

Ray

 

[Jay11]

Whoa! What's up with these ranger tranys. How can a vehicle be so badly designed.
I am now looking at this ranger/s with trepidation-like a male porcupine approaching a female porcy. Seems am just reading how bad their tranys are. It's mind boggling.

 

[rusty ol ranger]

That's not an A4LD, its a 4R55, which is the same design, but better.

I thought the A4LD went up to 97??

My bad.

 

[adsm08]

I thought the A4LD went up to 97??

My bad.

No, 94 was the last year for the A4LD. 95 Started OBDII (on the Rangers and Explorers at least) and the 4R44/55 which is a very similar transmission but fully electronic.

 

[adsm08]

Whoa! What's up with these ranger tranys. How can a vehicle be so badly designed.
I am now looking at this ranger/s with trepidation-like a male porcupine approaching a female porcy. Seems am just reading how bad their tranys are. It's mind boggling.

The Ranger automatics aren't actually that bad. They all had teething issues, just like any other vehicle would, but once you get to 95 and into the 4R/5R series the reliability goes way up. These days it seems like a lot of them have problems because the newest ones are 8 years old and approaching 100K miles, and an automatic transmission is a wear item. It's a long-lived one, but it is still a wear item.

In ten years at dealerships I have replaced one Explorer trans in a 98 (200k miles), pulled a handful of Explorer transmissions from the 02-10 style for the servo bore repair, adjusted one band in a Ranger to correct a shift flare (the jam nut worked loose), and outright replaced more than a dozen in F-150s and Expeditions.

 

[91stranger]

I wouldn't pay 1800 for it if it has shifting issues. If it had a random hard shift here and there then maybe, but if you are saying its 1st,2nd and 3rd gear then there's something wrong. I doubt getting the fluid to the proper level will fix it. If the fluid is over filled then it sounds like they know about the issue and put Lucas or some other trans fix fluid in it. I would talk him down to 1200 and say you would have to put in a trans (worst case scenario). if you pay 1800 and put 1000 in it then you could just find a lot nicer truck for 2800. I'd pass unless they dropped the price a lot but I'm a cheapo lol.

 

[Shran]

Could potentially have some damage from being run low on fluid because of the leak and then being overfilled doesn't help.

If it were me and the truck is in good shape I would try talking them down some more. If it were a 200k mile truck I wouldn't bother but where it's at, you could expect to get many, many more miles out of it easily. Maybe you can pick it up for a bit less and set some cash aside for a trans rebuild if it needs it in the future.