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flashing overdrive light

42K views 9 replies 9 participants last post by  Dauntless 
#1 ·
We have a '99 Ford 350 power stroke. For no apparent reason the light on the gear shift near the overdrive on/off button starts flashing. If you stop and turn the engine off and restart, it quits. A local mechanic "says" he put it on some diagnostic computer and changed out a part to the tune of darn near 500 bucks and duh, it is still happening. We took the truck back in and they checked it again with some hand held deal and now they are saying O rings and we probably had only 30,000 miles left on that tranny. The truck has 121k miles on it. Any thoughts, suggestions or advice would be very much appreciated. We're seniors trying to make it on social security so things like transmissions scare me a bit. I have a feeling the $500 I spent was p'ing in the wind!! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/shrug.gif
 
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#2 ·
I don't know what other situations it will happen in, but in my '99 the button was bad so they switched out the whole shifter and the problem was solved. On my 02 the light started flashing, but that was because I was stuck in the snow and the tranny was overheating. Does the overdrive work? Is there any situation that makes it start or stop again?
 
#3 ·
Have you checked the fluid level? Is the tranny slipping at all?
 
#5 ·
simply have them check the upper harness over behind the flasher button on top of column for a short if they have'nt already done so. i get alot of them in here w/ that problem w/ the wires chafing against the column & some times the the wires wear into. the codes if its the problem would have been clutch slippage codes.
 
#6 ·
Miracles never cease, I found the invoice. They replaced the Torgue Converter Solenoid to the tune of $276.55 for the part, $20 ATF fluid, $130 for labor and $12.50 for freight totaling $439.05 It started flashing immediately again within no time at all. The OD does work, but we manually turn it off and on for going up hills etc so it won't start flashing. Again, the only way to turn the flashing off when it does start, is by turning off the engine. We did have some trouble with the shifter itself, the end of the gearshift broke off and we crazy glued it back on. Been fine ever since. If the light starts flashing it will shift hard at a slow speed. At a higher speed it doesn't. My hubby is really interested in all your input. Very helpful and thanks a lot. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
#7 ·
does it go in and out of overdrive? Ihad that happen twice at about the same mileage. The first time i replaced the shifter and it fixed the problem. about 20000 miles later it came on again and wanted to stay out of eoverdrive and turned out to be the solinoid ( or how ever you spell it) inside the tranny.
 
#8 ·
Sounds like your previous bill did not address your problem and I would bring this up to the shop. This is why having your own code reader is so important. That way you are not at the mercy of these crooks. Even if you bought a superchips unit, keep it for a code reader and not use the tunes. Or get a SCT2 programmer from DPTuner with awesome tunes and code reader.
 
#9 ·
[ QUOTE ]
Miracles never cease, I found the invoice. They replaced the Torgue Converter Solenoid to the tune of $276.55 for the part, $20 ATF fluid, $130 for labor and $12.50 for freight totaling $439.05 It started flashing immediately again within no time at all. The OD does work, but we manually turn it off and on for going up hills etc so it won't start flashing. Again, the only way to turn the flashing off when it does start, is by turning off the engine. We did have some trouble with the shifter itself, the end of the gearshift broke off and we crazy glued it back on. Been fine ever since. If the light starts flashing it will shift hard at a slow speed. At a higher speed it doesn't. My hubby is really interested in all your input. Very helpful and thanks a lot. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[/ QUOTE ]Have you checked the connection to the VSS, It may be loose or corroded....
 
#10 ·
I don't have a solution to this but this happened to me too. The OD light would flash and it seems like the tranny wasn't in 1st gear. I thought the tranny was dying. This happened all the time. I took it in to have codes read but everyone said there were no codes. Shortly thereafter, my batteries went dead. I replaced the batteries and haven't had the OD flash since then which was mid November 2006. I don't know what the deal was but all is fine now. Still looking at upgrading the tranny.
 
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