A lot of vehicles, as they age, may encounter this problem. The linkage
gets a little sloppy and all of a sudden that parking/neutral switch doesn't
engage/disengage all the way. I've had it happen to several cars I've
owned, not necessarily Dodges. In most cases, the final answer was to
replace the switch. In the meantime, though, I found that a tap on the
shift lever will do the trick. You don't even need to take it out of Park.
It's that close or it could be that the switch has dirt, oil, gunk and is
sticking.
HTH,
Ron
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-dakota-truck@buffnet.net
[mailto:owner-dakota-truck@buffnet.net]On Behalf Of Kyle Kozubal
Sent: Sunday, July 30, 2000 4:15 PM
To: dakota-truck@buffnet.net
Subject: DML: Update: Starting Problem
Well this is odd, and not sure if it could be related to my cold rough idle
or not.
About two months ago, I posted a message concerning a starting problem I
have/had with my truck. I went to start it one day, and nothing happened.
Not even a crank, just completely dead. Everything worked though, CB, radio,
lights, horn, etc. Well about an hour or two after tinkering with it, it
fired right up. I was pretty set that the starter solenoid was starting to
die/short out. Since then, I have had only 2 problems with it. Both times
since the inital problem, when I went to start it, nothing....completely
dead. Not even crank. Same exact conditions as above. The second time it
happened, I remembered someone saying they had a Park/Neutral switch
problem. So I turned the key over, so I could move the tranny lever back and
forth through the gears and then returned the tranny into park. It fired
right up. This last time it died, I ran the lever through the gears/ranges,
and put it back into park, where it fired right up.
Where is this 'safety park/neutral switch' located at? Think this is my
problem? Could this switch eventually 'die' so much that it would not allow
me to even do the tranny lever trick....thus leaving me stranded? Would my
truck still crank though if this swtich was fautly? During the 3 times it
has acted up, I couldnt even get a crank out of it, like there wasnt even a
battery in my truck. If not, I wont fix it, otherwise, it might be a good
replacement if it is easy to get to.
Kyle
93 Dakota 4x4 V6
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