I have a 96 town & country minivan w/ 150k mi. Recently while driving I heard a clunk, my rpm guage shot up to 3500 and my engine shut down. after a short rest i hobbled home at very low speed. I was told it was the trans. I took it to a trans. shop and was told it was the planitary gear and was told it would cost 1000. of which I paid in cash. One week later while driving at about 35mi.hr. I hit a small bump in the road and the rpm guage went wild again to 3500 and it certainly souded like the engine was straining. Back to the shop it went and was told they would take care of the problem. I picked it up a few days later and was told that they overhauled it completely and that I wouldnt have the problem again. Here we are just a few days later same problem. A friend told me it might be the rpm sensor. This is becoming very frustating and I dont have any more money to take some place else. I have a receipt stating a 6 mo. warranty.
Firstly, I think you should actually be glad you got 150k from that transmission. As I understand they aren't much good past 100. Mine is now junked, but I bought it right after the guy had his replaced at 97k. And, that one had the optional transmission cooler.
Now, I am not a mechanic, but you should know if it's the RPM gauge or the transmission that's defective. You can hear the motor revving.
As for the repair shop, your only alternative might be to ask for your money back if it's not working so you can take it to a different place. That is not only fair, but likely enforceable in small claims court. If it should get that far.
But, again, 1000 bucks for the transmission overhaul seems like a *deal*, compared to the 2-3k that I have heard they go for.
But this answer is not helpful at all! If you have the same symptoms after having the tranny, rebuilt, and overhauled, then obviously that was not the problem to begin with. Mr. Stern was correct! the person who did this work was a tit-head. Any tranny shop worth anything would have had the cehicle scanned for codes to see, what the fault was, if it even was the tranny. Most of the problems of so called tranny's are the vehicle spped sensors. here's an idea. Actually spend $50-
100 at a Dealer so they can scan the transmission computer, to see were they ACTUAL problem may be. Then when they pinpoint the problem, get it repaired were you want and have the Tranny shop re-imburse you for unwarranted repirs that did not fix the problem.
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It really sounds like you got taken badly. I do NOT believe that this so-called trans shop changed out the planetary gear. Doing so is a -major- teardown and any reputable transmission shop would almost -certainly- have told you to rebuild the entire transmission.
Have a look at the following, others on this group have seen this link, this shows all that's involved in simply REMOVING the transmission, let alone tearing it down to replace the planetary gear:
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I did this R&R job myself and it took me over 36 hours to remove and replace it. Now granted this was the first one of these that I have done and an AWD to boot, plus a lot of time was spent running around, plus this time includes setup and teardown. I'm sure if I have to do it again it will take me half the time. Plus I don't have a lift and used jackstands and a cherry picker. But I would expect a fully equipped shop, with air and a lift, which has experience with these, to take at LEAST 4 hours to pull the trans out of a FWD van and another 4 hours to put it back in. And to tear it down to replace a gear, that would mean the gear had cracked/stripped/fragmented/ broken which means the entire trans hydraulic system would be contaminated with metal particles/flakes, to do it right your talking tear it completely down, clean everything, and reassemble with rebuilt torque converter, selonoid body, and flush the trans cooler as well.
And this isn't even to mention that if the planetary was broken that it is very likely the vehicle wouldn't have moved AT ALL! With my trans, it DID break a gear (you can see it in the pics) and it had 1st gear only, no 2nd,
3rd, 4th and no reverse. And that is just because the gear that broke isn't involved in 1st gear, I think the planetary is involved in all gears but I am not going to look in my book right now.
This is why these jobs take 2-3 thousand bucks. The place that I took my trans to get rebuilt charged $1400 for the rebuild alone, that does NOT include the R&R cost. And it took them a week and a half to get to it because they had a backlog of transmissions, and I believe about 4-6 hours to tear it down and build it back up and test it.
And yes you can get remanufactured transes for $700 from some places - torque converter not included, shipping not included - and almost certainly rebuilt with Chinese parts made out of silly putty and JB Weld. God help you if the core they used had broken gears in it.
My guess is as others have said is you have a problem with the speed sensor. Most likely the input speed sensor because this speed sensor is mounted right under where the transmission cooler lines go into the trans, and often these weep a little fluid, the fluid can run down onto the sensor and contaminate the electrical contacts from the sensor to the wire plug. Oil is an insulator and if the springs in the plug that plugs into the sensor are weak, dumping trans fluid in there isn't going to help anything. Also, this sensor and the output speed sensor are well known failure points. Failures of either of these components will create an error code that a scan tool can retrieve, either a scantool such as the Chrysler DRB which dealerships have, or the OTC Genisys which many independent garages have.
My suggestion is this - go to an electronic store and buy a can of contact cleaner. Find the input speed sensor it's right under the 2 trans cooler lines, and above the selonoid body (the metal box in this picture):
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Unplug the plug going to it, be careful to not break the plastic keeper on the plug, just bend it away from the socket body just a hair when pulling out the plug. Spray contact cleaner in the socket and into the plug contacts, let it dry or spray canned air into it to dry it out. Reassemble. You can also do this to the output speed sensor it is to the right of the input speed sensor, it's a bit harder to reach from the top but you can get it.
There is a chance doing this will fix the problem. But to be sure it's the speed sensors, get the transmission scanned.
No, it doesen't. If they really could do that they would be rushing the job so damn fast that they would almost certainly be making mistakes right and left.
The cheapest remanufacturer/rebuilder in the country that rebuilds these and ships them out all over the country that I've seen advertised is Phoenix Hard Parts in Phoenix AZ, they sell them for $625. But, this is without converter, and shipping is an additional $260, plus you have to pay to ship your core to them which is at least another $200 or so in shipping costs, plus if your core has anything seriously wrong with it - like a broken gear in it - they don't accept the core and you get no core refund.
And while they advertise American-made parts, they don't advertise American-made 'hard parts' (ie: gears) which is what really matters since the gears are what take the power and cheap gears will fall apart under load.
And these guys do them on an assembly line, the idea that some corner transmission shop could do the same job for the same price or cheaper is preposterous. A corner shop could perhaps do a lot -better- job, but not cheaper.
What are you talking about. If you copied the thread properly, it was for the OP to get the vehicle scanned properly ie: read for transmission trouble codes, and repaired properly ie from a more reputable shop then he was at, and get the tranny shop that already bilked him twice to re-imburse for fraudulent repairs.
I guess it all depends on your idea of what "reputable" means. You suggested having the dealer diagnose it then have it "repaired" where he wants. Why would you have somebody work on your vehicle that you don't trust to properly diagnose it?
Since when is the dealer the only one that can read trouble codes? That's patently false. Any competent repair shop will have a scanner that can correctly pull the codes. The key is COMPETENT shop.
It's people like him (and you) that keep those places in business. He got what he was willing to pay for, most likely. As long as folks shop for a repair facility using price as the only criteria, those people will be getting hosed and those places will be around.
What's obvious to me is that you don't have a clue.
Nope! I'm the guy that just told you you're full of shit. And you proved me right!
UMM, by what, wanting him to keep going to the same place to have it repaired, and repaired, and repaired. But you are so smart you haven't told us what is wrong with his tranny, that it keeps going into limp mode. So, Einstein, tell us! Hello, we're waiting for the brilliance of your so helpful answer.
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