Working Through Transmission Troubles…
A claim was recently made on a Ford/Lincoln 6F35 transmission. It was a fresh install of a used transmission, and the car wouldn’t start. The donor vehicle was a front end hit with damage to the core support. It was a driver when it wrecked.
We had a claim for no communication/no start and the shop tells us it’s setting the following codes: PO706, PO707, PO710, PO713, PO740, PO743, PO750, PO753, PO763, PO979, P1702, P1921.
For starters how is it a communication problem when you have a dozen transmission codes? These are mostly range sensor and shift solenoid codes. Given this specific application the first thing you should be doing is looking at the side connector before installing the transmission. We went over solenoid strategy and why it’s important previously, that solenoid ID is printed on a sticker next to the connector and on others it’s also on the range sensor. While taking the photo of the ID inspect at the connector and pins themselves.
In the world of auto salvage we have some different problems you just don’t see with factory/dealer parts. We send transmissions to shops strapped or banded to pallets. Those straps/bands frequently go across delicate plastic pieces like the side covers on 6F35s. After bouncing around on a truck inevitably the covers break, damaging the connector.
On this particular claim the shop agreed that this many codes means there is likely something wrong with the wiring/TCM on the car and they inspected the connector and cleaned all the pins, cleared the codes and the car worked and those codes didn’t come back. They delivered the car back to the customer and it was gone for less than a week.
Now the complaint is the vehicle won’t move and codes P073D and P175B are active. These aren’t codes we very often see. P073D is for unable to engage neutral, P175B is for a misadjusted/disconnected shift cable. The shop of course is arguing it’s a bad transmission again and demanding replacement. The fluid still looks good and there aren’t any internal transmission fault codes. We don’t ever see these codes so after digging a little further we found that the shifter cable was stretched. Replaced the cable and now the customer is out driving the car.
— Brandy Patton
Product Services / Technical Support
