It wa 6* when i left for work this morning and About half way to work I started to feel a slippage, I thought it was black ice cause we just had a big snow, but apparantly i was loosing tranny fluid. I made it to work and the puddle continued to drip under the right side of truck. I did a fairly thorough check At lunchtime and it SEEMS to be coming from a 'U' shaped metal tube , about 3/4" diameter ,that goes into some sort of 4" diameter metal canister that is attached to the rear right side of the engine. why is tranny fluid up there. ? I know It is not coming from a normal sized tranny line or coming out of the fill tube. The downpipe coming out of the turbo is covered in fluid. The only good news is that the fluid on the ground does not smell burnt. I am having the truck towed home later. I can't fit it in my garage so I will most likely have to wait a bit to check it out better. give me some ideas , thanx , DAVE

 

Sounds like the heat exchanger for the tranny.

 

these trannys have a heat exchanger ?????

 

Yes, that is what it is, if you are lucky a line cracked. If not maybe the unit (canister) cracked.

 

My guess is the short rubber section that contains the check ball. This check ball is designed to keep the trans fluid from backflowing back into the tranny when engine is off. It can be removed and a simple metal line put in it's place. You just have to remember to pop it in nuetral for a few seconds to pump the fluid before driving off. This is a bad spot for a rubber hose, just below the exhaust manifold, and close to the exhaust pipe and turbo. Lots of heat to degrade the rubber.

The heat exchanger is a good thing. The fluid gets warmed up from the coolant in the winter, and it helps cool it in the summer. The drawback is if you are really towing something heavy and really working the tranny (building up heat) it can drive your engine temps up. But that is fairly rare unless tranny is slipping bad.

BTW, I think it is a dealer part only. Kevin

 

kevin, thanx

What ISN't a dealer part for these beasts , I started snowing here agin. i just rented a little car for a week. anyone have an idea what this part costs if i need one?????????????

 

I have a new check valve if you need one.

 

Since you have a '95 more than likely what happened is one of the funky plastic clips used to attach the lines broke. These were discontinued in '96. If you want to avoid future problems replace all of them. You can't just replace the clips, the new lines are different.
Parts list with prices here http://dodgeram.org/tech/transmissio..._couplings.htm

 

What Infidel said...been there