Hey guys, 1993 Dodge Shadow, 3.0 and A604 transmission. Got up this morning and cleaned up the engine bay from yesterday's transmission fluid change, (searching for a fluid leak, long story). Degreaser on the oily parts, then a 5-gallon bucket of hot soapy water, and another bucket of clear hot water to rinse. Towel dried the major stuff off, and installed a new idle air control valve, as the old one was acting strange. Went and ran some errands for about an hour and the car drove and shifted flawlessly. It sat in the driveway for a few hours, then I washed it. Went to go on another errand and it's locked in 2nd gear. Came back home and checked for codes. 12, 17, 55. 12 and 55 can be disregarded. 17 means the engine has been running cold for too long.
I've known for a while that the thermostat must be stuck wide open because it takes forever for this car to warm up in cold weather. Unplugged the negative terminal for a few minutes, plugged it back in, and the tranny still starts and remains in second gear. Checked codes again, 12, 55. This time it hasn't noticed a cold engine, but the transmission is still locked in second. Have unhooked the battery a couple more times and gone for test drives, nothing changes. Still no new codes.
Checked the transmission control module for moisture, but being at the right front corner of the engine bay, it didn't get any degreaser or hot water in its general area. I'm not even sure if this is a water intrusion problem or not, just trying to figure out the possibilities since the TCM doesn't communicate error codes.
Any ideas what is suddenly going wrong? Pretty much anything that goes wrong with the engine or transmission in these cars and they default to second gear, so there's a lot of narrowing that needs to happen. Thanks for any input.
I've known for a while that the thermostat must be stuck wide open because it takes forever for this car to warm up in cold weather. Unplugged the negative terminal for a few minutes, plugged it back in, and the tranny still starts and remains in second gear. Checked codes again, 12, 55. This time it hasn't noticed a cold engine, but the transmission is still locked in second. Have unhooked the battery a couple more times and gone for test drives, nothing changes. Still no new codes.
Checked the transmission control module for moisture, but being at the right front corner of the engine bay, it didn't get any degreaser or hot water in its general area. I'm not even sure if this is a water intrusion problem or not, just trying to figure out the possibilities since the TCM doesn't communicate error codes.
Any ideas what is suddenly going wrong? Pretty much anything that goes wrong with the engine or transmission in these cars and they default to second gear, so there's a lot of narrowing that needs to happen. Thanks for any input.
New sensors arrive Thursday.
