THis has been a problem for over three years on a off and on basis. I thought I had it fixed when I removed all the ground wire connections for the alternator and the PCM and the problem went away for about six months. It cam back about two weeks ago and now at highway speeds it is out of lock up more than it is in lock up mode. The truck has an edge Juice with attituce and a rebuilt transmission with a billet TC.If any one knows of a good mechanic in the Denver area that really knows how these trucks work, I would really like to get this truck in his shop to get this fixed once and for all.

 

I read that if you pull the APPS wires from the loom that they share with who knows how many other wires, the lock-unlock issues go away!
Worth a shot, no? Mike

 

There is a place in Aurora, bad neighborhood unfortunatly, on about 8th and Dayton but he's been in business for YEARS, he just rebuilt his shop about 7 years ago and it was very nice. The name is Gooches Transmission, his name is Myron. I've had 2 different Fords rebuilt there with great results. He's worth a call for a Dodge. He is or was not into upgrading the internals on the Fords but maybe he will on the Dodges.

HTH

(303) 363-9783
760 Dayton
Aurora

 

I have had a similar problem with my '99. I too did the ground cleanup as well as a direct ground for the PCM. Worked for a year and a half. The lock/unlock came back and I tried the "tin foil on the alternator wire" trick ..... and it has been fine so far. I felt quite silly perched up there with sheet of tin foil.... seems kind of hokey. It worked though and it takes about 2 minutes, 5 if you do a real professional job.
Alan

 

Thanks for the lead on the guy in Aurora. I will give him a call this week. When you use the tin foil trick, how far do you have to go into the loom? It seems to me that if you do it outside the main loom it will not do much. Let me know. At this point I would try clothes pins on the wire if it worked.

 

Keep in mind, this is not a transmission defect, it is an electrical problem. Keep trying things like cleaning grds, run a new grd wire from the PCM to battery, new batteries, noise filter, etc. Good luck.

 

Saturday I was going to have the batteries checked to see if maybe they were the problem. Before I headed over to the parts store I decided to check the water and it was very low so I added water to each of the batteries and before I could get to the store life got in the way and I had to drive the truck about thirty miles of freeway miles before I could get the batteries checked and lo and behold the truck ran perfectly. So tomorrow I will get them checked and hoelfully make a final post to this issue. Thanks to everyone that helped with this one.

 

Well, I had the battaries checked this morning and they came in fine. the truck ran perfectly all day long. I know this does not make sense. I am posting this so that others with this problem can check the basics and the cheap stuff before they spend money at a shop on something they can do at home.

 

Good to hear, lots of problems with the auto trannys are blamed on batteries, be it grounds or just weak batteries. Sounds like you solved your problem with low fluid levels. One to put in the memory banks for later.

Thanks for the update and keep us updated in the future weather good or bad results.

 

It has been a week now and the truck is back to running perfectly. Not one hick-up. Who would a thunk.

 

clean all of your battery post terminals it works try it

 

It's quite understandable- the batteries are the only noise filter in the system. Having bad batteries or not enough water, bad contacts etc will lead to those problems.
I've had some of those problems before I installed my optima. (old batts were shot.)
(I do also have a noise filter -homemade- on the APPS wire, and I run the TPS wire from the ECM to thePCM separate from the wire loom.)

AlpineRAM

 

i also just recently had the same problem. i tried the aluminium foil and it worked for a little bit and then i wired in two grounds to the pcm(i beleive) on the block. took off the fuel filter assembly pulled out the allen in the plug then took wires from pin 49 and 30 and spliced in a ground to each one. put her all back together and it runs perfect no problems at all.

 

had the same lock up trouble with my 99.tried everything with no luck.finally went to the dealer and he cleared the trouble with a re-flash of my ecm.has been good for 2 years.$80.00 dollars well spent.