Originally Posted by Raleigh234

I solved the problem!

Earlier I said I replaced the Range Sensor, which was a mistake. I meant to say I *bought* one. Today, I got under the truck to actually replace it, and the range sensor was extremely loose (I could twist the bolts with my fingers). The shifter cable was also rubbing against part of the frame, because the sensor itself wasn't seated correctly. After replacing everything and tightened it all down, I noticed several problems were fixed:
- My shifter in the steering column is significantly more stiff
- Truck starts in park (finally)
- Shift points were much more firm
- Erratic shifting has disappeared
- Mystery squeal that I assumed to be a bad wheel bearing disappeared (it was the cable against the frame)