i have a 98 eddie bauer explorer. 2wd. i wanted to make sure i have all 5 gears shifting properly in automatic, how do i check that, since it shifts so dam softly you can hardly feel it normally? If I floor it, it goes past redline and fails to shift unless i let off the throttle, and if i shift manually its fine from 1st to 2nd, but then from 2nd to D it feels like a huge drop in rpm, like it missed a gear. Is there a way to diagnose it easily by manually selecting each gear?

 

The 5R is a very strange transmission! The 2nd position on the shifter is actually the third forward speed. To understand this, throw whatever you think of gears and speeds out the window. You can have 2 forward speeds with just one gear. 5R has 5 forward speeds with 3 gears. How does this all work?

Well, when you accelerate to redline from a stop, the OD will quickly engage the 1st gear and cause a quick shift. Since the OD band has a taller ratio, the 1st gear actually becomes taller. 1HI as I will call it (Gear you launch from) has a 2.47:1 ratio. 1LO with the OD engaged is 1.87:1. THEN it will shift into the 2nd gear which has a 1.47:1 ratio. When you select "2" on the stalk, you ARE putting it into the 2nd gear, but in reality it is the third forward speed. That is why you feel the clunk moving the shifter from "1" to "2"; you are skipping that quick OD speed shift inbetween.

So the shift cycle goes like this (Assuming you are in D with overdrive on) 1HI -> 1LO -> 2 -> 3 -> OD. You use 3 gears but 5 speeds actually come out the transmission. I think it's a pretty neat idea, but it's definitely something very hard to explain. Sounds like you need to have your torque converter inspected. I would say you need to adjust the throttle valve, but these are electronically shifted trannies today. Mine shifts quite quickly with 116K miles on it. I couldn't be happier with my 5R.

 

yeah if i floor it, it sounds like the engine is goin to explode if i dont let off the gas. and you never feel it shift, no matter what, the only way to tell is to listen to the engine, because the tach never changes rpm between shifts until you get to 4th and 5th gears. Feels like mush, torque converter is prolly shot. and their nice design of placing the exhaust 1/2" below the transmission sucks too, now in order to change the converter I have to deal with a rusty exhaust system. AND the heat from the exhaust against the tranny is not what you want to deal with,,,, theres tons of room to reroute it around the tranny, what engineer had to design it like this....