PRND21 Alignment

On a '99 Explorer Sport 4.0 automatic, column shift. How is the gear shift indicator aligned?

What would cause it to become unregistered suddenly? Over one day it shifted such that each gear apeared midway to the right of the marking. Now slowley it seems to be drifting even further to the right such that to be in reverse the read out almost says N...

The arm and ball joint at the transmission seem stiff with little or no play..

Steve F

******************************************************************************* Steve Finberg W1GSL snipped-for-privacy@mit.edu PO Box 397082 MIT Br Cambridge MA 02139-7082 617 258 3754 *******************************************************************************

This is for a regular 99 V8 but I'd guess its the same procedure

Adjustments

Remove the upper instrument panel steering column cover. Place the gearshift lever in the position. Rotate the gearshift lever clockwise until it bottoms out (first gear), then rotate two detents counterclockwise (D) position). Hang a 3.6 kg (8 lb) weight on the gearshift lever. Center the pointer in the middle of the 19 position. Rotate the thumbwheel located on the bottom of the steering column to adjust the pointer. Remove the 3.6 kg (8 lb) weight. Carefully move the gearshift lever from detent to detent and compare with the transmission settings. Readjust if necessary. Install the upper instrument panel steering column cover.

There is a picture with this I could not post that shows a small wheel that you adjust to get to the "19" position.

Hope that helps!