1999 Lincoln Continental trans. problem

[mavis]

Help! I have been to the dealer twice and they can't find anything wrong with my car. Every one to two weeks when I am at a stoplight or stopsign the car 'puts itself in neutral'. I can rev the engine with the accelerator but basically I just have to wait about ten seconds for the car to put itself back in drive in order to move. The engine does not die and no trouble lights come on. Any ideas?

[Steve Moran]

dose your fluid smell burnt of look darker red then normal or even full? you could have a valve sticking in your valve body. I will suggest a product called (TransX) or (LubeGard) give eather one of them a try it could clean out any varnish you mite have in your trans. It sure won't hurt and it could be cheaper then a new tranny. smile.gif

[Nick]

I know the fluid is advertised as lifetime, but maybe a fluid and filter change might help.

[Steve Moran]

Nick even if the fluid says lifetime they still put a change intervals in the owners’ manual the filter still catches contaminates and the valves still tarnish or stick. And even with the product saying “lifetime” I shy away from any thing that dose not have a exact time limit because lifetime could be the life of the product and not yours or the automobile that could be 30,000 miles. I would read the information very closely. I would say any filter; fluid change is worth the price of a case of oil. I don’t know what product you have in your car but I bet they will not do any more then give you back your purchase price for the fluid if something goes wrong.
Even Amsoil engine oil suggests changing the filter and a quart every 3,000 miles even though you don’t have to drop all the oil for 75,000 miles.

[Steve L]

The same thing happened on my 95. Replace fluid and filter. Use Mercon V at least. I have switched to Mobile full Synthetic in mine at 91000. At 104000 have not had a problem yet. Still a little early to tell. Just remember this. "No oil is for a lifetime."Too many contaminants, too much heat, too much shearing of the oil.

[mavis]

Thanks for your help....my fluid is not burnt and there is barely 40k on the car. This only happens in first gear. If it was the fluid wouldn't it happen all the time in any gear?

[franco]

Has the dealer checked out the MLP(maual lever position) sensor it's like a neutral safety switch. It could be bad even if it doesn't pull a code.