At 08:12 AM 3/14/01 -0600, you wrote:
><snip>
>I am thinking
>now about just making an appointment with a good tranny shop and have them
>analyze it. Can they hook my truck's tranny up to a computer/analyzer and
>see what is going on and if it is tranny related or not?
No. They can do some line pressure tests and some visuals from the outside
but nothing that someone with a FSM could not do themselves. Once they
start remove the tranny pan and take out the valve body just to see what's
what,
you're looking at big bucks.
>Since Bob suggested to look at the torque converter and the torque converter
>solenoid, I figure the tranny shop should be able to tell if the tc is the
>culprit, right?
Again, you can do this yourself by unplugging the wire connector to the
solenoid
and drive around town for a bit. Unplugging the wires to the solenoid will
prevent
the computer from locking up the converter. All this will do is build some
heat
in the tranny because of the slippage now that the converter is not locked up
and cause you to use a little more fuel than normal. As long as you don't
tow anything, take it up to highway speeds for a long period of time or climb
a hill, it will be okay.
>Next question, how would a bad torque converter or bad solenoid cause my truck
>to stumble and stall on ocassion and not all the time?
When the torque converter locks up, it puts the tranny into a 1-to-1 connection
with the crankshaft. Lockup should normally be done at speed (on Dakotas,
I think that it's about 35 mph in 3rd and 45 mph in 4th). Below this, if
the converter
is locked up, you are putting so much resistance on the motor that it will
stall.
It something like decelerating to a stop and leaving it in 4th on a manual
and not putting in the clutch. It's more sensitive nowadays because the engine
is running at slower rpms anyways with the overdrive gears. The only reason
this came to my mind was that you mentioned that the mechanic told you
that your tranny was shifting into 2nd at 8mph.
>I am just going to make another appointment with another place, possibly even
>Dodge, and take this thing in. No sense wasting my money anymore on parts
>which arent bad just hoping that new ones will fix the problem.
>Kyle 93 Dakota 4x4 V6
I agree that it does not make sense to spend money on parts in the hope
that new ones will fix the problem. The saying in the auto world " diagnose
before replacing" has never been more true. Your stalling problem is an
intermittent one, meaning that finding the cause is going to be very difficult
whether it's done by a do-it-yourselfer or a mechanic. There are other
areas that can be looked into by yourself but it depends on how accurately
and completely you cab describe what happens and under what conditions
when the stalling occurs. Example: I cannot recall you writing about the
"click" noise before today.
It's naturally your call but don't expect immediate success because you've
put it in the hands of a repair shop. I've been trying to figure out my
upshift
problem for over a year. I did talk to a tranny shop. The diagnostics that
they would start with are nothing that I could not do myself with a vacuum
gauge. Besides, my problem only occurs with manual upshifts at WOT
over 5000 rpm. If I wasn't racing, I would not know I even had a problem.
How are they going to test this or even know it's fixed on public roads?
As always, best of luck.
Bob
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Jun 20 2003 - 12:00:10 EDT