Hi! I am brand new here and kind of new to a 1996 7.3 turbo diesel. I love the truck and it's been really good to me. My friends got the truck because we ride horses so of course it's used to haul horse trailers. As you can imagine this problem gets annoying when trying to back up to a trailer and it stalls everytime you move from drive to reverse and reverse to drive. The truck runs great! No problems once it's in gear and going forward, it doesn't stall. A piece of this puzzle is that sometimes the overdrive OFF light starts to blink. In order to make it come out of safe mode I have to pull the 20 amp fuse. I had to code read a year ago and several things came up and they wanted to rebuild the transmission for 5 grand and I told them to stick it. So...with my limited knowledge I kind of think that my torque converter isn't working right somehow and that's causing my problems BUT I don't want to throw parts at this truck! So I turn to y'all! Any ideas guys and gals???

 

Is the truck chipped? If so, the chip might be loose on the contacts and/or aren't clean.

 

No its not

 

You need to get a scanner and get that code, that may shed some more light on the problem. It will help us help you.

I know there is only a hand full of scanners that will talk to our trucks.

Hopefully Mark, our transmission guy will chime in. But it sounds like there is something going on in there. I would be cautious about driving it untill you find the issue, otherwise you may do more damage, which is more money.

 

Does it do it all the time? Or only when warmed up?

 

Usually that issue is I believe from low pump pressure. The code is indicated BY the light flashing "HELP" !!!! You prob got lucky getting by this long..if it needed rebuilt then....it may be absolute trash now.

Welcome aboard!!

 

We have been driving it for over a year with the light occasionally flashing. I think I have figured it out a little. I live in SC and when I hit an incline I keep the RPM right around 1500 and just let the speed drop if need be. That way I don't feel that "slip" or "drop" that usually comes before the light starts to blink. I can go weeks without it blinking. It's worse when I tow. I used to never blink if the overdrive was turned off but that is no longer true.

As far as the stalling goes...there isn't a pattern for it. It happens almost everytime it's first put into gear in the morning. Then it's usually better but some days are really bad and I have a terrible time trying to back up to a trailer...you know forward and back, forward and back for a gooseneck UGH lol

 

Mark holds more knowledge of these transmissions in his left thumbnail than the rest of us combined. But from reading his posts, I can guess what he would tell you first - what has been suggested already - get the codes. All the testing, re-enacting, trying various conditions, etc. are all guesswork without the codes. And no, there's no code that says "do a $5000 rebuild". Even at the tranny shop, the diagnostic device is not connected to the cash register, even though a lot of such shops seem to think so.

 

Low fluid level can cause this but since you've been driving it a year like this I can almost bet that you need a rebuild now.

 

There is so much truth in this statement. It made me chuckle a little. I think we have all been there.

 

The first thing to do is to check the transmission fluid level. Check it warmed up idling in park. If the fluid is low it will cause stalling.

You also need to get the codes read. It's been trying to tell you for a long time that SOMETHING is wrong. Minor transmission issues often turn into a complete rebuild if they are ignored. The places that read codes free cannot read these codes. You need either a good independent shop or a Ford dealer to read them.

 

That's great!!!

 

The fluid level is normal and has remained normal the whole time. It was low enough to add a bottle of Lucas transmission to it. As soon as the light starts blinking again I will go to the transmission shop and have the codes pulled.

 

The codes SHOULD be stored, should be no reason to wait.

 

The codes are in there. The longer you put it off getting them read, you may be adding to the costs of your repairs. Get the codes, come back here and let us know what they are.