My son and his best friend from childhood have moved in with me recently while waiting in student housing. My sons friend drove his 87 f150 with a carburated 351 here from his home, about 400 miles. He said his truck ran great the whole way here. After sitting for three days, he went out and started it to move it, and the transmission would not engage in any gear. It has fluid, and linkage is all connected and moving. I finally got it to go in reverse, and after shifting into reverse 6 or 7 times, into drive, but it seemed to be slipping. He doesn't have a lot of money, so I told him I would ask around here to see what the general consensus is. Fluid is a little dark, and has a slight burnt smell.

 

AOD transmission?

Sounds like the cable broke loose from the carb linkage and didn't apply full pressure and it burnt itself up driving it home. Very, very common back in the day.


This is not stock, but you can see what I'm talking about. The lower cable, with gray clip.


Those clips get brittle and break. If the cable is not pulled forward with the throttle, the transmission will not apply enough fluid pressure and it will basically slip. Drive it long enough and it will burn it up. It might not feel like it was slipping, but over 400 miles it sounds like that is what happened.

 

Not sure which tranny it has, I will check that when I get home. I know his dad just put a brand new holley on it, so I'm wondering if that might be the problem.

Thanks for the reply!

 

I think Freightrain hit it on the head.

I sense a self-inflicted wound brought on by the new carb. installation.

 

OK, according to the code on the door jam, K, I think it has a c6. The linkage off the carb is different from the picture above. Here is what he has:

OK... Doing this from my phone, can't figure out how to attach a picture. Carb has a bar coming off back side (inside) of linkage (kick down lever), throttle cable and a ball chain (cruise control I think) attached to the same point.

 

I'll be darned. I never would have figured that F150 came with a C6 in 1987. I learn something new everyday. If that's the case the linkage does act as a kick-down versus controlling the pressure in an AOD. I can't help you with a C6...

 

Doh........ya, the C6 is still vacuum operated so the kickdown is just for passing gear. Unlike the AOD which uses that cable to control pump pressure, basically.


Sounds like you just have a basic burnt up C6? Finding a junkyard small block C6 will not be easy. Been gone a long time now.

 

I'm thinking so. He wants to have aamco look at it to make sure, so I guess I will be towing it to them. Thanks for all the help!

 

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