I've been reading for a long time, but had to register because I couldn't find a good answer to this problem.

first off I have a 97 F-250 with the 7.3l/E4OD with 165k miles, truck is great condition all around. I'm the 2nd owner and this truck seems to be very well taken care off. All stock, no mods.

One day going down the road on a cold morning the O/D light starting flashing and the trans went into limp/safe mode. I limped it home (about a 40min drive). I also notice the torque converter wasn't locked up. At 65 It was spinning 2,000rpm were it normally would be approx. 1600-1700. I got it home and the next day changed the vss sensor in the rearend and left the batteries disconnected for 15mins. After changing the vss, the o/d light never came on again and the trans returned to shifting normally, only the torque converter wasnt locking up. At first it seemed like it would take miles of driving (20mins) before it would finally lock up. This whole time i was taking it easy so as to not make too much heat. Now it doesnt seem to lock up at all(altough I haven't driven it for more than 15mins at a time). I haven't been driving it often because I dont want to cause any damage. The trans shifts well and the torque converter worked fine until the o/d light came on for the vss. The fluid is red (not burnt or dirty) and is in the dead middle of the crosshatch on the dipstick, and all brake lights work by the way.

any ideas? I need to get this running right again because my daughter's grandparents use the truck to pick her up from school during the week.

 

well one thing comes to mind is the brake pedal sensor, my buddies truck was doing that and he thought it was time for a BTS tranny but a 15$ trip to ford took care of that. if thats not it and your sensor seems to be fine then its time for a convertor. that seems to be the magic age for the e4od, you certainly didnt help the situation by driving it in limp mode for that long either. driving where it should be locked on the TC circuit can do alot of damage, when its throwing enough pressure to lock the TC its actually slipping and heating up the tranny fluid in tern will eventually kill your forward clutches. so untill you can get this scanned at a reputable tranny shop i would not drive the truck at all unless you have a tranny lined up or can foot the rebuild cost.

 

is the brake pedal sensor seperate from the brake light switch or is it the same thing?

I remember reading somewhere that there was a pin in the ecm connecter that you could ground and use to test the solenoid to see if its actuating, but i cant seem to find that thread now. I'd like to test that first to see if it actually works before I start chasing all the little things that could be wrong.

I only have Sunday off of work, so I'm kind of SOL if I can't figure this out on my own before next week.

 

well if you want you can run a TC lock up switch to see if its working or not, it will by pass all the crap. but the brake sensor overides the TC circuit, if its junk it wont let the tc lock, but i belive you wont have fully functional brake lights. i dont know the extent of it, just it can effect your TC.

 

the brake sensor you are talking about, is that the one on the master cylinder that looks like a pressure sensor? I don't see anything else on the brake pedal other than the brake light switch under the dash.

 

yeah the one ontop of the pedal under the dash, its not much of a sensor

 

Well, im assuming the brake light switch is working since i have brake lights working. I guess next i need to ground the purple/yellow wire to see if i can make the tc lockup. Do i need to be driving down the road when i do this, or should i be able to hear the solenoid make some kind of noise if i just put the truck in drive with the key on but the engine not running?

 

Well i ran a jumper wire from the purple/yellow wire and a second wire from the negative on the battery and ran them into the truck. I took off down the road and hooked the wires together (grounding the purple/wire) and got nothing. All the connections on the harness look good. No corrosion or missing pins. The trans shifted great. Is there anything else i can check or does that pretty much mean im looking for a torque converter? What about the tc solenoid? Anyone have any suggestions?

 

I finally found a code reader and pull the codes with koeo
P0603
p0344
P1728
P0741

 

Actually the P0741 was from the koeo. And the others were in memory.