Transmission Shifts early

[BrentW]

Have a issue I am stumped on. When I got this explorer it had a vacuum leak and other issues and the previous owner had messed with the idle screw on the throttle body. I read up on it and adjusted it per some advise on here. Unplugged the TPS, set the idle to about 800rpm out of gear and then plugged the TPS back in, pulled the battery cable to reset everything and hooked it back up and now it idles good and no check engines lights.

But now I have a shifting issue. it feels like the tranny shifts early and wants to get into overdrive before it needs too and by the same logic it seems like i have to give it too much gas to get it to drop out of OD and drop a gear. Not a bunch of gas but it is like the transmission things I am going faster than I am. Almost like to me there is a speed sensor that doesnt know what is going on or is maybe confused by the TPS. The speedo is correct and everything else seems fine, The tranny just acts odd. It does upshift through the gears fine. The only weirdness other than that is that if you are on the highway at a moderate speed like 55 or so and you give it just a tiny bit more gas it acts confused and bucks a little like it is trying to downshift and then upshift again really fast because it doesnt know which way it wants to go. I hope that is enough info to go on. I cant tell if I need re adjust the static throttle blade position or if I have another issue somewhere.

 

[Joe in NY]

The bucking is transmission gear hunting. That is a major sign of low tranny fluid. How many miles?

I would service the trans. Drop pan, new filter, and refill.

 

[BrentW]

Sorry for the late reply. That sounds plausable and I had previously read up on this subject and found that you cant just put fluid in the damn thing like a normal transmission. Than you Ford. So I guess I need to look into buying some tools to fill the tranny with.

 

[Joe in NY]

Well ya see... Ford thought it would be a great idea to make transmission "filled for life". That means non serviceable. Unless under extreme duty, then service every 30K miles. This is directly out of my 2002 Ford Explorer Service Manual Volume 1.

I have to say, GM's are soo much nicer to deal with! Far better designs on everything! My first Ford...

 

[Joscibo]

Well ya see... Ford thought it would be a great idea to make transmission "filled for life". That means non serviceable. Unless under extreme duty, then service every 30K miles. This is directly out of my 2002 Ford Explorer Service Manual Volume 1. I have to say, GM's are soo much nicer to deal with! Far better designs on everything! My first Ford...

I disagree with GM building them better. My 05 Yukon has had it's share of problems. Tranny at 65,000 and suspension problems galore. I have stuck plenty of money on a $52,000 rig brand new in 05. That's a lot of money for a vehicle that has had an extra $10K spent on repairs since new. Going back to Ford !

 

[Joe in NY]

Really? What I meant is, not quality, but terms of maintenance. GM is far ahead of ford as far as making things easy! The oil filter sticks down on a GM! Not sideways! And the oil filter and oil drain are right next to each other! You get a transmission dip stick and drain plug etc.. those kinda things... (my uncle who loves ford, says GM is far easier to maintain and service than ford...)

We had a 2002 LT Auto Ride Suburban, we loved it to death. Never gave us any trouble except for the AC compressor which was under warranty. We got 100K lovely miles out of it. By far it blows our 2007 LTZ out of the water. Our 2007, has had a good deal of problems. But nothing real major... New rear air shocks, its on its 3rd brand new compressor from Arnott. Both front wheel bearings, rotors, calipers, and upper ball joints. Even thought it has the LC9 with the problematic Active Fuel Management (V4 mode) we are lucky that ours is NOT drinking oil and anti freeze like most, and it still runs great getting 16 mpg on the highway! Not bad for 140K+ The engine, transmission, diffs, and t-case are in great shape.

GM doesn't build better, but designs better... My 02 Exploder needed all 4 front ball joints at 62K miles! They had no boots! Ford quality haha (every car company has its cons)

 

[BrentW]

Ok.. Well back on topic here. I got a 1/8" npt fitting, pump and 3qts of Mercron V. I pulled the allen head drain plug out and some fluid came out. I chalked that up to sloshing into the fill pipe from inside the tranny. I them pumped 3 quarts of fluid into it and disconnected my fill hose. As soon as the hose disconnected fluid started coming out. I put my empty quarts up to it only to find that all three quarts came back out. It appears the tranny was full. So whats next? Filter? I know that means dropping the pan and I really didnt want to go that far if I didnt have to. Is there no chance that the throttle being messed with in the past is causing this? Lately on really hot days it has even tried to spin up in gear when its trying to shift. Very odd. If the tranny is going I need to trade this thing in or sell it or something. I cant afford to replace this tranny.

 

[Joe in NY]

Did you run the truck on the road for min of 15 min to warm up tranny? Transmission MUST BE at least 160* to do this procedure, according to my service manuals.

 

[BrentW]

Nope.. i did not catch that part. I had drove it about a hour before but the fluid had cooled down. how much difference will it have made in the fluid level? it actually seemed to drive better last night so i am not sure sure if mixing the fluid to where I have put three new quarts in and let 3 brownish nasty looking quarts out of it helped it or what.

 

[Jobe]

Sounds to me like your TPS is out of calibration or bad. The TPS is a major factor in when the tranny shifts. If the problem wasn't there before you messed with the throttle body and just showed up after it's probably not your fluid.