68rfe shifting problems

[fritzcartage]

Having some trans problems with 07 mega 6. 7 4x4. I noticed the other day that it seemed like it didnt want to shift into the upper gears like normal. Then this morning my friend, who drives my truck when we snowplow b/c I am running one of our loaders, got it stuck in 4wd low. I got in it and got it back into 2wd after only a few minutes. On the way back to the shop I noticed that the shifting problem had gotten worse, not sure if it has anything to do with being left in 4 low, but could be a contributing factor. The shifting problem, from what I can tell, is from 4th to 5th gear. The rpms fluctuate and feels like the trans is slipping, then will shift into gear and seems to run ok. I have been doing some research on this transmission and have come to find out that there are filters inside of it and one of them is a spin on filter. I had no idea it was in there the filters that are on my older trucks are a simple screen on the suction side. Our maintenance for transmissions is every 20,000 miles to suck out the fluid and replace it with new. We run amsoil atf. I consider myself pretty competent and diligent with maintenance issues. But I am very upset with myself for not knowing about these filters. I have never changed them. I think the dealer may have around jan. 2009 when the truck had 25,000 miles. It now has 130,000 miles. The truck has the egr deleted, along with the dpf removed and replaced with a 4" straight pipe. I also have an H&S xrt programmer tuned to the performance setting. I aint gonna lie about the truck being babied either. This thing works. Hauls heavy trailers and moves mountains of snow. My friend is a trans rebuilder and is on his way to test drive the truck to give his opinion. I'm pretty sure I'm in store for a trans rebuild, but am hoping and praying it may just need filter changes. Was wondering if anyone has had this problem and turned out to just need filters and not a rebuild. I kinda doubt it. But you never know. Thanks for reading and hope to hear some good news. Also if it does need a rebuild was wondering if anyone could point me in the right direction for how much and what kind of parts to put in it so this doesn't happen again.

 

[fritzcartage]

My buddy just left the shop. He said there's an accumulator plate that sometimes breaks away from the valve body b/c it has bolts on the bottom but not the top of the plate. They now make an updated plate with bolt holes on the top and bottom. We're gonna drop the pan and fluid first thing in the morning and see if thats whats goin on. If it is he says we'll have to drop the valve body to drill and tap new holes in the valve body. Maybe thats the problem. Hopefully. He doesn't think its the filters.

 

[sag2]

You know it could be. It has been quite a few years since that condition cropped up, and if my memory is correct it was 545 RFE and not 68. But the valve bodies are almost identical.

 

[Hoefler]

First thing I would do; Drop the pan , change the filters ( there are 2 ), clean out the pan and re-install. Stop the idiotic practice of sucking out the fluid!

 

[fritzcartage]

Thanks for the sugar coating: Pulled the pan and lettin it drip dry now. Gonna crawl back under there 2nite and look at it. Gotta go to the house and fix a hot water heater now.

 

[HBarlow]

First thing I would do; Drop the pan , change the filters ( there are 2 ), clean out the pan and re-install. Stop the idiotic practice of sucking out the fluid!

Will sucking atf out of the transmission damage seals or other parts? I've always had a gut feeling that sucking atf out or allowing a shop to "flush" it would damage something but never seen actual damage proven.

 

[fritzcartage]

I believe we have had good luck with sucking out the fluid. I have limited knowledge of the inner workings of a transmission, but from what I understand (very basicly) is that its full of trans oil (hydraulic oil), the pan holds the excess, theres a screen over the sump pickup, as it shifts between gears it wears the clutches and bands out, so all the worn material from the clutches and bands is suspended within the oil. We use a pneumatic oil extractor that holds 6-8 quarts to suck out the fluid, via the dipstick tube, and just replace the fluid that comes out with new. If you drop the pan the trans always has fluid left in the torque converter and you cant get it out unless you would use one of those power flush units. I dont know how one of those works. So your replacing around 1/2 the fluid in the trans this way. And you dont have get covered in trans oil or climb under the truck. If it turns out that the filters were the cause of this problem then my procedure will turn out not to be very good. But soon I will know my friend is on his way over to look at it right now. I have a bad feeling its gonna need to be rebuilt though. The oil is very dark and doesnt smell the best almost a burnt smell.

 

[fritzcartage]

Well he says we're gonna try replacing the plate on the accumulator, replace the solenoid pack and replace the EPC (electronic pressure control solenoid) and install the new filters. He says if that doesnt work it wouldnt ruin the new parts we put in and they would all be replaced when he rebuilt the trans for us, so we would have to buy them anyway. But if it does work we dont have to pull the transOo. Keepin my fingers crossed. Thanks to all who have and will respond. Ordering the parts tomorrow and installing them on Monday evening. GO BLACKHAWKS!

 

[cerberusiam]

but from what I understand (very basicly) is that its full of trans oil (hydraulic oil), the pan holds the excess, theres a screen over the sump pickup, as it shifts between gears it wears the clutches and bands out, so all the worn material from the clutches and bands is suspended within the oil

I don't doubt it has a burnt smell. You likely have seal and friction damage due to the maintenance. This is not going to make you feel any better but your maintenance routines are the source of your problems.

The oil in the sump is probably only 1/3 of the total the transmission can hold. Usually far more is held in the TC, cooler, and trans galleries. By just suck the sump dry you only did a partial change and left the buk of the old fluid in there, that fluid that had friction and steel in it. Two bad things about a stock Dodge transmisison is they make metal and sludge. If you don't clean them out it all stays in circulation. The pan is a settling pond for the sludge that the fluid cannot hold but it won't all settle out and stay there. The turbulence in the sump will still contaminate new fluid if it is not cleaned. If you do not ever clean the pan and exchange the fluid you are just destroyng the trans slowly. Fluid exchange can be done with a machine or on the floor by alternately filling and draining the trans from the cooler return line. You get some mix in the sump but with the cooler line off most of the fluid is routed out and not mixed. It is too simple to do a fluid exchange to ignore.

The filters are there to be changed frequently also. The sump filter is rather large and does not that great a job of keeping suspended material out, big chunks only. Changing it on a regular basis is required. The spin on filter picks up the crud spit out the TC because NCH makes it a large material generater. IIRC, it is bypassed when it plugs and then the dirty fluid just goes right back into the sump.

The second thing you need to consider is Amsoil is not rated or recommend for these transmisison for a reason. It does have the additives to maintain the frictions and seals like ATF+4. Unless you rebuild with differnet seals ans frictions it is a liability. Amsoil relies on its suspension of solids abiltiy to operate a long time but that in itself is hard on the seals, frictions, and steels. Dirty fluid is very abrasive in high pressure high friction environments so keeping it as clean as possible AND the correct aromatics that cook off over time is critical.

Recomended exchange intervals for hard use is 20-25k. It does not make sense to dump expensive fluid that often and gain less than nothing from it. You could get away with this in a car or 1/2 ton gasser to a point as they don't stress the fluid like a diesel and don't get used as hard. A working truck has a lot of differences and this is a major one that will bite eventually.

I would be surpised if you don't need a full rebuild right away. If not now it is only a matter of time. Sorry, no good news from here either but maybe this will help you understand the challenges a bit better.

 

[fritzcartage]

Apparently I'm not as diligent and compitent as I thought

 

[fritzcartage]

Cerberusiam is right. The trans will need a rebuild. We put it back together tonite with the new plate, solenoid pack & the epc solenoid. Filled it back up with fluid and its still having the same issues. And I will probably do alot more damage to it tomorrow as we have a foot of snow coming to Chicago. But what can I do. The truck has to work through the snow storm. Hopefully it makes it through. Thanks to all who have read and responded. Soon we will be adding a 2013 crew cab 5500 to our fleet as the 1996 has finally been retired after years of dependable service

 

[MLee]

Fritz, to bad about the rebuild. But there has been conversation about the spin on filers etc contained in these transmissions since they came out. You need to frequent the forums more often to keep up on your trucks and there maintanence, you use them hard in the business. Now you have been given sound advice from the brothern.

 

[fritzcartage]

Yes, I do need to frequent the forums more often. We push our trucks well beyond their designed capabilities. For what we do to them I think they are holding up better than average. My friend is rebuilding the trans as we speak. He is waiting for the parts to come in to finish it. Hopefully done in approx 1 week. He said that 1 of the snap rings let loose inside the trans and the pieces did some damage inside it. The cause was either over revving when it was stuck in 4-low or just the abuse that we put them thru. I'm sure its a combination of both. The transmissions of these trucks has always been the weakest point, in my opinion, the other being the electronics. We are going to be experts on pulling transmissions as my brothers 2005 service truck's trans needs to be pulled and rebuilt now because it has lost the band on 1st gear#@$%! And our 2000 truck has broken the front drive shaft u-joint while under power it was spinning under the truck and took out the trans lines and cracked the case of the trans. So we will pull the trans on the 96 and swap it into the 2000. Cant hardly wait. Should be a real party with all that transmission fluid raining on us over the next few weeks. We have decided to order a 4500 instead of a 5500 for licensing purposes. Hopefully the aisin trans can hold up alot better than these others.

 

[AHarris]

I don't doubt it has a burnt smell. You likely have seal and friction damage due to the maintenance. This is not going to make you feel any better but your maintenance routines are the source of your problems.



The oil in the sump is probably only 1/3 of the total the transmission can hold. Usually far more is held in the TC, cooler, and trans galleries. By just suck the sump dry you only did a partial change and left the buk of the old fluid in there, that fluid that had friction and steel in it. Two bad things about a stock Dodge transmisison is they make metal and sludge. If you don't clean them out it all stays in circulation. The pan is a settling pond for the sludge that the fluid cannot hold but it won't all settle out and stay there. The turbulence in the sump will still contaminate new fluid if it is not cleaned. If you do not ever clean the pan and exchange the fluid you are just destroyng the trans slowly. Fluid exchange can be done with a machine or on the floor by alternately filling and draining the trans from the cooler return line. You get some mix in the sump but with the cooler line off most of the fluid is routed out and not mixed. It is too simple to do a fluid exchange to ignore.



The filters are there to be changed frequently also. The sump filter is rather large and does not that great a job of keeping suspended material out, big chunks only. Changing it on a regular basis is required. The spin on filter picks up the crud spit out the TC because NCH makes it a large material generater. IIRC, it is bypassed when it plugs and then the dirty fluid just goes right back into the sump.



The second thing you need to consider is Amsoil is not rated or recommend for these transmisison for a reason. It does have the additives to maintain the frictions and seals like ATF+4. Unless you rebuild with differnet seals ans frictions it is a liability. Amsoil relies on its suspension of solids abiltiy to operate a long time but that in itself is hard on the seals, frictions, and steels. Dirty fluid is very abrasive in high pressure high friction environments so keeping it as clean as possible AND the correct aromatics that cook off over time is critical.



Recomended exchange intervals for hard use is 20-25k. It does not make sense to dump expensive fluid that often and gain less than nothing from it. You could get away with this in a car or 1/2 ton gasser to a point as they don't stress the fluid like a diesel and don't get used as hard. A working truck has a lot of differences and this is a major one that will bite eventually.



I would be surpised if you don't need a full rebuild right away. If not now it is only a matter of time. Sorry, no good news from here either but maybe this will help you understand the challenges a bit better.

I take my truck to the Ram dealer for annual transmission maintenance. Do you know if dealer service departments make it standard procedure to ensure the fluid is changed in the ENTIRE transmission and not just the sump?

 

[cerberusiam]

Do you know if dealer service departments make it standard procedure to ensure the fluid is changed in the ENTIRE transmission and not just the sump?

It varies so much there is no way to tell. You have to ask and insist or you never know what you will get.

 

[MLee]

Why don't they manufacture these TQ with a drain plug? so all the fluid can be changed. Dealers only going to drop the pan and do filters.

 

[cerberusiam]

Why don't they manufacture these TQ with a drain plug? so all the fluid can be changed. Dealers only going to drop the pan and do filters.

That would cost more money, like adequate sized internal parts, better clutches, and all the other fixes.

 

[rscurtis]

Why don't they manufacture these TQ with a drain plug? so all the fluid can be changed. Dealers only going to drop the pan and do filters.

My '83 Mercedes has a TC drain plug. There is a cost involved, and of course, it's another potential leak.

 

[fritzcartage]

Trans is back in. Had a clunking noise in driveline somewhere, was freaking out about it, then crawled underneath and found that I forgot to tighten the driveshaft to the rear end. But now have another problem that has resurfaced. Started a thread about 2 months ago for the abs light, brake light, check gages light and the speedometer doesn't work.

 

[HBarlow]

I drilled and tapped the torque convertor and installed a drain plug on a Furd automatic 20 years or so ago but never tried it on a 48RE or my current Aisin. Theoretically it could cause an imbalance of the tc but I never noticed a vibration on the Furd.