At least the front seal has gone out, based on your description of the loss of fluid. Changing the front seal requires some kind of tool to align the bell housing to the rest of the case. I haven't had to do this before, but other members of this forum have.

I'm not exactly sure of how the modulator affects the pump operation; I just know that it controls up shifts depending on load. I've never changed it before, but it looks to me that the easiest way to do it would be to first drop the Y-pipe with the cats.

I do not believe this leak can damage the pump. But low fluid pressure can cause the bands and clutches to wear excessively.

 

Hi what a great site! I have been going over the site for the past week looking for various information, but have a problem with my 88 Bronco II A4LD trans. (I know this is for Aerostar, but this thread is the only one I found with any reasonable answers.)

Symptoms: in OD position, I can feel it shift into gear, but will not lock up. In regular D, R and 1 & 2 positions, shifts into gear, slight pause, then locks into gear. Drives fine in every thing except OD position. In D position, shifts smoothly at approx. proper RPM for 1, 2 and 3. Ran the obdc II tests, with no error codes generated other than engine idle a little high.

Also checked connections to 3-4 solenoid and converter solenoid. Look okay, see no bad wires or loose connections.

The transmission was completely overhauled about 4 years and 30,000 mi ago (3rd time after 2 bad ones), and has been fully serviced annually to keep it in good shape. The OD position loss was a sudden failure, about a 5 minute drive on paved road.

Any thoughts as to potential cause befoer it goes to a trany shop that wants 450.00 to scatter parts all over, then "look" and charge 1400 for another rebuild?

George

 

Not sure about an 88 model A4LD, but shifting to OD & TC lockup is electrically controlled in later versions. I had a similar problem in my 95 Aero & the problem turned out to be a blown fuse.
The vehicle speed sensor system was powered off the accessory light circuit & a shorting door light switch on the front passenger door caused the fuse to blow, with the resulting loss of OD.
Fuses are cheap & trans shops are not - worth a check.

 

Thanks for the quick reply! I think the OD is controlled by the computer. Did check the fuses, but all looked okay. I am going to do some more wire checking, just to see if some one had cut a wire and patched it back together. A former owner had a bad habit of doing just that, and periodically drives me nuts.

George

follow up on this: found no bad wires, am at a loss as to any more ideas. Any help appreciated. I ordered a transmission manual so hopefully that will help.

I am amazed by the number of question in the various ford enthusiast forums, and even more amazed at the lack of responses unless dealing with just flat doing away with this transmission.

 

Hi all out there,I am new to this please help,I have rebuildt my A4LD (Bronco ll 1987) gearbox,I have new cluch plates and bands in plus seals,the oil preesure is good and done as the book says,but still I have no Drive or over drive,gears R,1 and 2 work good please can some one help me out terry

 

Make sure you put in a new modulator (you must reuse the small pin that came out with the old one) and make sure you have a good vacuum line to the modulator.

 

Ok thanks for the tip will try this and let you know how it goes tes

 

Hi there Thanks for the help,the other week I got myself a new modulator with pin
today I checked it again and found that the new pin was shorter than the old one
put it back and all works fines now so thanks once again tes

 

hi i have a 1990 ford ranger ext. cab with the 4.0 v6 and the a4ld transmission and i recently started having problems with my transmission going into gear after taking it out of gear/drive. if i put the transmission in park,neutral,revers their is a long delay going back into gear/drive and will not go into gear at an idle i have to slightly rev the engine but once it goes into gear it shift just fine and never slips. revers works like its supposed to. the truck has 213,300 miles on it and the transmission was rebuilt in 2004 before it sat up for 7 years with out running i bought it and got it running and the transmission has ben working fine ever since i got it running. it roughly has 13,000 miles since rebuild and i have no idea what the problem. any ideas of what the problem could be?

 

Your problem is consistent with low fluid, but could be other issues too. Hint, if you have to rev it up to get it to engage, you need to get this addressed NOW. The longer you wait the more internal damage the trans is doing to itself, and the more expensive it will be to repair.

Very often, a new filter and new fluid can help, old fluid and clogged filters cause all sorts of problems.

 

IMO - A4LD is a weak thing and the only way - swap with T5 ore manual tranny from small truck

 

And that is your opinion, but my experiences with A4LD with upgraded parts and modified valve bodies is that they become pretty indestructible. Yes a T5 is a better trans, but it is hardly a good candidate, because no factory bellhousings exist to mate it to either a 3.0L Vulcan or a 4.0L Cologne. So you have to have a custom bell housing and then you still have to fabricate the correct trans mount and you have to have a custom driveshaft made too.

The A4LD can be build to support a little over 300 crank hp. A 3.0L depending on year in an Aerostar can produce up to 155 crank hp, and the 4.0L can get up to 165 crank hp. Since none of the engines you can run in these is anywhere near 300 hp, the upgraded A4LD is basically bulletproof as long as it is maintained correctly.

Whats interesting is that once an A4LD has been fully upgraded to its maximum potential, it still won't slip if you exceed its maximum rating, instead the shaft will begin to twist. Thats how tough these can get, the clutches and bands can be so tough and the gears so resilient, that the new weak point is the shaft itself. This starts to happen on applications that are putting out around 380 hp.

I am about ready to bring my mom's '95 Aerostar back to life. I am rebuilding the 4.0L engine completely, and then I will be using the upgraded A4LD that came out of my '94 Aerostar that got totaled. I used that van to run a 350 mile journey from Salt Lake City to St. George hauling scrap that could weigh as much as 4500lbs. I made this journey every month. The upgraded A4LD never had any problems with this.

 

really I used tranny from russian truck. Becouse they have changable bellhousings and I modified A4LD bellhousing for this tranny. My friend used T5. T5 is full synchro, Tranny I used had 1-2 gears synchro only and shiftings like U drive eighteenwheeler - floating gears ore double clutching. Floating gears is very fast way to shift. Much faster then clutching full synchro tranny)

Really I'm a trucker) LOL

Now I drive Taurus, W-star and Ranger. All with auto))) LOL, but my Freightliner got 10st Fuller.

 

I would prefer a T5 just for the control over shifting primarily, and the reduced maintenance requirements would be a bonus. Also, the possibilities of pressurized fluids just waiting to blow a seal or pressure cylinders wearing out and leaking are always in the back of my mind.

However, the problems of fitting a T5 is worse for a 4wd van; not only is there a custom bellhousing requirement, the transfer case needs to be adapted to the gear box. There are a variety of scattershields that are made for the T5, which may be adapted to a Cologne engine (I don't know for sure), but I don't think anyone makes an adapter to connect the Dana 28 TC to the BW T5 gear box.

 

Yep, U a right, you cant use dand 28TC. BW manual ore GAZ69 may easyly be used, but no all time AWD, you can only engage front axle.