Hey! I'm new to this forum, although I have frequently browsed posts here to learn about fixing my 3 Rangers.
I currently have a problem with my 89 4x4 auto transmission. I was driving home two days ago, doing about 40 MPH on a flat, straight road, in overdrive. Approaching a hill, I gave her some throttle and the tranny downshifted like normal, but my engine kept speeding up and truck slowed down. I tried manually shifting, but had no go in any gears. I coasted off the road and stopped. Had no go in reverse either. There was no noise at all when it stopped working, other than the engine rpms increasing. Checked ATF, was full and smelled fine. I've rebuilt a couple of manual trannys over the years, but know next to nothing about automatics. Also, when put into park, it still rolls, it acts like it's stuck in neutral, is this possible? I know my first move is to drop the pan and have a look, but my garage is literally as big as all outdoors and the weather is not cooperating. Any advise would be appreciated, as to what might be wrong or what to look for. Thanks.

 

Transfer case could be in neutral or something in the rear diff could have broke.

Try engaging 4x4 and see if truck moves.

 

Thanks for the response. I did try 4x4, no go there either. I tried to rotate rear drive shaft by hand, with a big pipe wrench, it's still turning rear wheels. I was wondering if torque converter broke internally, but I dont think that would cause parking pawl to not engage in park. I don't know enough about internal workings of transmission to know what could cause this, maybe catastrophic failure?, but it's been a tight shifting transmission, only has 130k miles on it, to the best of my knowledge, and it didn't sound like anything broke, just stopped working.

 

The Park pawl is mechanical so should engage when shifter on the drivers side of transmission is moved counter clockwise all the way
If truck still rolls in Park then transfer case may be in Neutral as said, or broken

Parking pawl setup seen here: https://www.fixya.com/uploads/images...d2dfeb-3-0.png

This is located at the end of transmission on the output shaft to transfer case(or drive shaft in 2WD)
Moving the top mounted shifter arm all the way forward(counter clockwise) pushes the parking pawl down to engage one of the slots in the output shaft wheel, locking the shaft from turning
Nothing electrical involved, just mechanical
So this has nothing to do with the "transmission" parts which are located between the output shaft and input shaft and engine, so for sure not torque converter

Make sure the shifter is moving when someone in the vehicle shifts gears and puts it into Park
See if you can move the shifter farther forward into Park, if it looks OK then "next"

Next remove the Shift motor on the back side of transfer case, seen here: https://www.therangerstation.com/tec...t_motor-19.jpg
Red arrows
Blue arrows denote a "hockey puck" vibration damper which may or may not be there, but remove it first if it is

Once the shift motor is off you will see this in the transfer case: https://www.therangerstation.com/tec...ft_motor-2.JPG

In the picture the transfer case shift rod is pointed at 2high(2WD), which is where it should be if 4WD is not selected
Directly opposite 2H is Neutral, not marked, but its there, between 4H and 4L, none the less
Use pliers to move the shift rod manually, it only moves from 2H counter clockwise to 4L and then clockwise back to 2H, does NOT go 360deg
If it feels loose then something happened inside the transfer case and its in neutral

 

Thanks for the info. Gives me a good idea what to look for. Hopefully you are right, transfer case will be much cheaper/easier fix than transmission, I have one I can pull off of my 87 Ranger 4x4, but it's a manual trans, not sure if same transfer case as for automatic trans? Unfortunately I've got no time to work on it for a few more days, got my only other running vehicle tore apart, blown head gasket, have to get that put back together and up and running before I tear into Ranger.

 

Yes, transfer case is the same if both are electric shift, BW1350
And should have the same front and rear drive shaft connections

 

Right on. Thanks.