2004 Explorer Sport Trac, 2WD, 4.0L

Hello all,
Last night I had the valve body replaced to fix a 2 - 3 flare issue.
The valve body was from Wholesale Transmission Parts 5r55e 4r55e 5r44e valvebody ford rebuilt transmission part (version with "all" the updates)
It fixed the 2 -3 flare. All shifts feel normal.
Now though, I've lost just about all detent.
(hope I'm using that word properly)
When the needle is over P, it is in Park.
When the needle is over D, it is in Drive.
So, it isn't an 'alignment' issue, but before the vb replacement I could significantly feel the detent and now, the shift lever moves 'smoothly' through the PRND2L range.
Does this sound like something in the valve body isn't right?
Something that can be adjusted externally?
Something that needs adjusting AT(but not in) the valve body?
Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
-Gary

 

I just want to make sure I, and thus everyone else that reads this, understand the feeling. You're saying that you no longer have the physical "notches" between the different selected gears? I understand that detent is a resistance or a "stop" put on a lever or other mechanical device.
04 Trac should be column shifter right? Do you still have to pull the lever towards you (the driver) to move to the next gear, or does it move to the next selection with just the up/down motion?

 

I can feel a very small amount of detent.
The amount of feeling 'notches' before the repair I considered to feel normal.
I'm not a mechanic, hence me posting here, but I have driven 200+ different models of cars to know what normal detent should feel like.
I can move the shifter from R to D with just an EXTREMELY minimal amount of backward force on the column shift lever.

-Gary

 

Gotcha.

This is definitely not my area of expertise, but I believe this would be an issue inside the column itself. The work you had done shouldn't have affected the lever, right? That resistance and mechanism should be just related to the column and not the internals of the tranny.

 

To my knowledge, the column was never touched. The detent felt showroom perfect before the linkage was disconnected from the old valve body and feels very sloppy now that it is connected to the new valve body, so whether the replacement of the valve body should or shouldn't have affected the lever is moot. lol ...it did. The question is now, should something "at" the transmission(where the linkage enters the case), "in" the transmission(where the linkage connects to the vb), or something in the column(even though not touched during the referenced repair) be looked at for adjustment to return standard detent feel?

-Gary

 

Update: the tech that swapped the valve body for me just advised me that the most likely cause is that there was a thickness difference between the valve bodies which would affect the performance of the shifter detent spring. So, at this point, I’m left asking… is there anything at all that can be done to compensate?
-Gary