Finally, after at a total of 560,000 over both my PMs, we've finally had a tranny failure. Sorta. Here's the story, file it away in your brains for future use:
About 3 weeks ago I was cruising normally, lightly loaded at 600lbs. Wham - the transmission put itself into limp mode, which means 2nd gear only and a max speed of around 30mph. No reason why, no warning signs, no other symptoms. Jiggled various wires, prayed to various gods. The code read P0750 - shift solenoid A. No other codes. It was late so I slept on the PA turnpike.
Next morning started it up and it was fine. Shifted fine, but the code was persistent. Hmmm. Decided to try to make it the 90 miles home rather than pay for a tow. Made it 17 miles and it went back into limp. In a move that I don't recommend, I drove the remaining 63 miles home IN SECOND GEAR and ON THE HIGHWAY! Took it right to the transmission shop.
He futzed with it a while, and got it to fail again, but he wasn't inclined to make a definitive diagnosis. I didn't say I took it to a GOOD transmission guy. But while he was working on it, I did quite a bit of research on our 62TE trans. For me, transmissions and carburetors are like magical boxes filled with unicorns - I don't really know how they work.
For the most part, our transmissions are made of 4 basic parts. The torque converter. The fluid system (pump, fluid, and filter). The valve body/shift solenoids. And the 4th part is basically everything else (the gears, the bands, the unicorns). That's basically it.
Trans guy determined that the pump and fluid system were fine. Since it would shift fine when it was cold, I decided that the "everything else" was in working order. The torque converter was fine. So the remaining part is the valve body/solenoids, and technically the computer as well. In our vans, there is no transmission control module, it's all done within the main ECU. Trans guy did a good inspect of the wiring to the computer and declared it good.
This leaves the valve body and solenoids. In the 62TE, there is a thing called the solenoid pack which is bolted to the valve body. The solenoids are electric actuators that allow fluid to flow in various ways to the valve body, and the valve body does the actual shifting. In ours, there are 7 discreet solenoids but you don't service them, you simply replace the whole pack.
The job itself wasn't too bad. Unlike an old school tranny where the valve body lives above the pan, the 62TE has a separate pan as the fluid sump, and a large front cover which covers the valve body/solenoid package. You can see yours if you look straight down the radiator on the driver's side - that big round connector is plugged right into the solenoid pack under the large cover. Very easy to get to. All you need is ramps or jack stands and it's all right there. You remove the cover, remove 18 torx bolts, and the valve body comes right out. Separate the valve body and solenoid pack on the bench, bolt in the new one, and reassemble. No gasket needed, as these use RTV from the factory. The job took me the better part of a day, but a faster wrench could do it in a few hours.
The upshot: the solenoid pack is a whopping $150 for a rebuild with a lifetime warranty. Factory units brand spanking are around $250. Why so cheap? This is something I considered when choosing the PM over other vans. That trans has been in production in it's current form since 2007. It's in every minivan, and a ton of other Mopars with old V6 and with the Pentastar. I did what I normally do - I made a chart with 2014 PM, 2014 Grand Caravan, 2014 Journey, 2012 Town and Country, and 2012 Journey. Look up the PNs for solenoid packs and valve bodies and diffs and complete transmission assemblies. PN 5078709AB is the solenoid pack and it's identical for all of 'em. A part this high production means cheap prices.
Shook it down on a 750 mile run yesterday, and the trans shifts fine and the code is gone. I've now got a trans leak, but that's related to my sloppy RTV work and easily fixed. I also learned a lot about checking the fluid - it's easy and there's nothing really different about the 62TE than the Torqueflite that came in my Valiant.
More research revealed that the solenoid pack is a fairly common failure item, and it's failure is in large part what gave the 62TE a bad reputation, particularly in the early build years. But despite what we were all so worried about, having a minivan drivetrain in a big work van, the transmissions have proven robust. If the pack fails again in another 280k, well...I've got a lifetime supply of replacement packs!!
By the way, there's a magnet in the bottom of the pan. 280k of heavy haul miles reveals a mere smear of particles stuck to the magnet - almost nothing. Very happy with that. Overall, it's a safe bet that $150 will fix most of your transmission failure fears - it's what does the work and that's why it wore out.
NOTE: because I'm looking at million mile ownership, I went ahead and learned some other things. LQK asks squat for transmission assemblies (junkyard pullouts). Like $600. But for Promaster they get $1500. Why? Turns out that a complete factory trans does carry a unique PN, while all the other vehicles I mentioned all got the same assembly. I looked up the diff assembly, and it too is unique to PM. What's it mean? I betcha the PM gets a different gear set, or maybe a few different internal parts, which is why it carries a unique PN for the assembly. I also bet that you could bolt one in from a minivan no sweat. But I can't prove that.
About 3 weeks ago I was cruising normally, lightly loaded at 600lbs. Wham - the transmission put itself into limp mode, which means 2nd gear only and a max speed of around 30mph. No reason why, no warning signs, no other symptoms. Jiggled various wires, prayed to various gods. The code read P0750 - shift solenoid A. No other codes. It was late so I slept on the PA turnpike.
Next morning started it up and it was fine. Shifted fine, but the code was persistent. Hmmm. Decided to try to make it the 90 miles home rather than pay for a tow. Made it 17 miles and it went back into limp. In a move that I don't recommend, I drove the remaining 63 miles home IN SECOND GEAR and ON THE HIGHWAY! Took it right to the transmission shop.
He futzed with it a while, and got it to fail again, but he wasn't inclined to make a definitive diagnosis. I didn't say I took it to a GOOD transmission guy. But while he was working on it, I did quite a bit of research on our 62TE trans. For me, transmissions and carburetors are like magical boxes filled with unicorns - I don't really know how they work.
For the most part, our transmissions are made of 4 basic parts. The torque converter. The fluid system (pump, fluid, and filter). The valve body/shift solenoids. And the 4th part is basically everything else (the gears, the bands, the unicorns). That's basically it.
Trans guy determined that the pump and fluid system were fine. Since it would shift fine when it was cold, I decided that the "everything else" was in working order. The torque converter was fine. So the remaining part is the valve body/solenoids, and technically the computer as well. In our vans, there is no transmission control module, it's all done within the main ECU. Trans guy did a good inspect of the wiring to the computer and declared it good.
This leaves the valve body and solenoids. In the 62TE, there is a thing called the solenoid pack which is bolted to the valve body. The solenoids are electric actuators that allow fluid to flow in various ways to the valve body, and the valve body does the actual shifting. In ours, there are 7 discreet solenoids but you don't service them, you simply replace the whole pack.
The job itself wasn't too bad. Unlike an old school tranny where the valve body lives above the pan, the 62TE has a separate pan as the fluid sump, and a large front cover which covers the valve body/solenoid package. You can see yours if you look straight down the radiator on the driver's side - that big round connector is plugged right into the solenoid pack under the large cover. Very easy to get to. All you need is ramps or jack stands and it's all right there. You remove the cover, remove 18 torx bolts, and the valve body comes right out. Separate the valve body and solenoid pack on the bench, bolt in the new one, and reassemble. No gasket needed, as these use RTV from the factory. The job took me the better part of a day, but a faster wrench could do it in a few hours.
The upshot: the solenoid pack is a whopping $150 for a rebuild with a lifetime warranty. Factory units brand spanking are around $250. Why so cheap? This is something I considered when choosing the PM over other vans. That trans has been in production in it's current form since 2007. It's in every minivan, and a ton of other Mopars with old V6 and with the Pentastar. I did what I normally do - I made a chart with 2014 PM, 2014 Grand Caravan, 2014 Journey, 2012 Town and Country, and 2012 Journey. Look up the PNs for solenoid packs and valve bodies and diffs and complete transmission assemblies. PN 5078709AB is the solenoid pack and it's identical for all of 'em. A part this high production means cheap prices.
Shook it down on a 750 mile run yesterday, and the trans shifts fine and the code is gone. I've now got a trans leak, but that's related to my sloppy RTV work and easily fixed. I also learned a lot about checking the fluid - it's easy and there's nothing really different about the 62TE than the Torqueflite that came in my Valiant.
More research revealed that the solenoid pack is a fairly common failure item, and it's failure is in large part what gave the 62TE a bad reputation, particularly in the early build years. But despite what we were all so worried about, having a minivan drivetrain in a big work van, the transmissions have proven robust. If the pack fails again in another 280k, well...I've got a lifetime supply of replacement packs!!
By the way, there's a magnet in the bottom of the pan. 280k of heavy haul miles reveals a mere smear of particles stuck to the magnet - almost nothing. Very happy with that. Overall, it's a safe bet that $150 will fix most of your transmission failure fears - it's what does the work and that's why it wore out.
NOTE: because I'm looking at million mile ownership, I went ahead and learned some other things. LQK asks squat for transmission assemblies (junkyard pullouts). Like $600. But for Promaster they get $1500. Why? Turns out that a complete factory trans does carry a unique PN, while all the other vehicles I mentioned all got the same assembly. I looked up the diff assembly, and it too is unique to PM. What's it mean? I betcha the PM gets a different gear set, or maybe a few different internal parts, which is why it carries a unique PN for the assembly. I also bet that you could bolt one in from a minivan no sweat. But I can't prove that.