Ok. Heres the story. 2003 cummins SO. 47 RE i believe. My truck has not been wanting to start the last couple of days. Have to jump start it half the time. Yesterday, my truck didnt want to shift out of first gear. When it did, it would shift hard when it hit second and third and then not want to hit overdrive. Today, finally got the chance to get the batteries checked. Turned out to be dirty cables. Thought maybe the tranny problem was related to the battery problem maybe. It wasnt. Now, i dont have first gear. Only 2nd and 3rd. Wont go into overdrive. If i drive several miles it will sometimes shift into od. There was no warning either, the tranny just started acting up and hasnt stopped. Also, the tranny is overfull, i would guess by at least a quart, maybe two. Any suggestions? I have got to get to work tomorrow, but im afraid my tranny may be junk.

 

try to level out the tranny fluid first, see if that helps

 

How many miles on your tranny?

 

Tranny mileage is unknown. Truck has 206k miles on it. I put the last 60, or so on it

 

Fluid smell/look burnt? Good fluid is a cherry red, burnt is a reddish brown.

 

The oil definitely is not red. Its more of a brown color. Though it doesnt smell too bad. Im taking it in today for a tranny flush and filter change. Its just wierd that it happened all at once. I was hoping it was something electronic. Whats a new tranny cost? About 3k is what i heard

 

You can probably just rebuild it to stock if thats all you can afford, about $1800, maybe $2k. If your batteries died your PCM may be shot, I belive thats what regulates the voltage, so your alternator might not have been getting a field current to charge anything. Any codes thrown? If your PCM goes, it won't activate the solenoids in the tranny, and it'll act up similar to what yours is doing. I would have the PCM checked before you replace the tranny, just in case.

 

So a bad PCM will cause solenoids to malfunction causing the transmission to shift funny and burnt fluid?

 

You got it. The 47RE and 48RE are electronically controlled tranny's, controlled by the PCM. If that happens to fry, the tranny will do whatever the fried PCM tells it to, if thats nothing, it'll do whatever it wants. If it builds too much pressure, it'll often kick the solenoids over, and when that pressure is released, the solenoid springs will close them back up. Don't bother flushing the system, its too late, and often if it hasn't been done in the past, it seems to cause more problems than anything, don't ask me why. I'm not saying the PCM is bad, just have it checked, and check the continuity between the pins on either end of your connections, you may have shorted something out. Same thing happened to me when my OD wouldn't work on my 95. The connection had shorted out at the tranny harness, and I had to rewire the whole thing.

 

Yeah, i suspected something electrical may be happening since it happened in the middle of my battery problems. Im gonna have it checked. The tranny was serviced about 30k miles ago. Thanks for the tip, im gonna check it and see what happens.