Not sure what this is?? - Diesel Forum

1515 · 05-30-2006, 07:48 AM

I had a strange thing happen yesterday when starting my truck. It started normal but the power windows would not work and several of the warning lights came on. It would go into reverse but would not go into neutral from reverse, so it would not go into drive. It also made a grinding sound when I put it back into park. All the time the warning lights on and windows not working. After several attempts from park to reverse it eventually came out of it, all problems went away at once and drove normal after that. Started and drove normal this morning! Any ideas what this could be??

truckdrivindave · 05-30-2006, 10:03 PM

Is your truck mad at you or something.....Who knows? My best guess would be moisture in the air.... Just a few days ago after all that rain and warm weather come over here in Indiana, humidity built up in the air with fog...My rig did not start till after the 3rd try. I usually dont try starting again if it dont start the first time til after I waited 30 sec to a minute and restart starting procedure.

but since your tranny did what it did I might would consider replacing the tranny fluid. But it sounds more like moisture affected your electrical components on your rig. So that may be the cause.

1515 · 05-31-2006, 07:28 AM

I hope you are right Dave, just a freak electrical problem. I had a shop do a complete trany service where they suck all of the old fluid out, so I don't think i has anything to do with the trany. I was wondering if there is some sort of locating switch in the gear shift that may cause this. It hasn't done it again since.

truckdrivindave · 05-31-2006, 08:42 PM

Well that is good....Yeah there is a electrical switch of some sort to the tranny... I couldnt tell you more since I am not familar with the automatics...My rig is a 5 speed.....

IDMT · 06-05-2006, 08:08 PM

Okay, this may sound a little silly, and I certainly don't want to insult anyone's intelligence, but I had a similar situation happen to me several times. It occured because my ignition switch was staying in the start position.

When this occured, all my warning lights stayed on and the truck would shift into reverse but not neutral or drive. I felt like a complete dipstick when I finally realized what the problems was.

I replaced the ignition position switch under the dash, made sure the key switch linkage was in good shape, and replaced the lock cylinder. Everything seems to work fine now.

Just my dos centavos.

mdkarle · 06-06-2006, 08:57 AM

IDMT, sounds like you are on the right track, I had the same problem with my current F250 diesel I have now where all I have to do is make sure the key is in the right position after starting the engine so I have no problem with the dash warning lights and shifting. This is one of those problems that is common on a lot of ford trucks and cars with the same type of key and ignition switch. Before I bought the 1991 F250 diesel I owned a 1985 F150 with the same type of key and ignition that had the exact same problem where I always had to make sure the key was turned back to the right position after starting the engine.

1515 · 06-08-2006, 11:11 AM

I am now 99% sure that the ignition switch is the problem. Since then, the ignition switch would occasionally stick and now needs replacement. I think this problem was the first sign of the switch being bad but it was hard to tell because the switch appeared to have snapped back where it was suppose to be, but actually was not.

truckdrivindave · 06-08-2006, 06:26 PM

Well that is good to know/ I was not aware of this type of problem/ \that I will keep in mind if ever I run into that problem/ that is an interesting problem...