I got into my car to go to work and when I went to shift out of park (automatic), the button that normally pushes in refuses to do so. The car will start, she just won't come out of park (aka, won't shift).
Please, help if you can. This car is my only means of getting to work. If worse comes to worse, I'll call the family mechanic, but the guy charges a rape load of money to even look at the car.
i had that same problem in my 97 cav. it turned out that my brake light switch was melted and didn't work anymore. when you start the car, is your abs light on? i know when this happened to mine the abs light was on and i couldn't push the button on the shifter. check and see if your brake lights come on when you step on the brake pedal. if they don't come on, then its probably the switch. its only like a $10 part and takes 2 minutes to replace. its located right above the brake pedal. hopefully this helps and gets you back on the road
mine had that but was stuck in drive, took the whole damned thing apart and tried to isolate the problem but couldn't find it. hit the top of the shifter with the palm of my hand when i reached 1 notch below pisstivity and it just started working, apparently it was jammed somehow.
good luck
Maybe buy a new car. You know, one that doesn't suck as much as Homer.
jaaaaaay/kaaaay
Remove the shift knob. When you press the brake to disengage the the shift lock, try just pushing down on the yellow rod in the middle of the shifter. If that works, the spring in the knob either broke or is just dirty and has gotten stuck.
My grandfather tried that earlier. The yellow rod would still not go down when pressing the break.
After researching it a bit online, I think it might be the transmission control solenoid. Anyone else have any input on that?
well this might be a stupid idea but if none of their ideas work your manual shift linkage inside the tranny might be stuck and/ or snapped
It's definately not snapped because that happened to my car. If it were snapped she could freely move the shifter up and down the slide, it just never would go into gear. Though, it could be stuck.
Alexis wrote:My grandfather tried that earlier. The yellow rod would still not go down when pressing the break.
After researching it a bit online, I think it might be the transmission control solenoid. Anyone else have any input on that?
from my understanding of how things work (i could be wrong here), the transmission control solenoid is activated by the brake light switch. when the switch is pressed(stepping on the brake), it activates the solenoid which allows you to shift out of park.
i'd still check the brake light switch before looking into the transmission control solenoid. easy way to see if the switch is working or not is to step on the brakes, if the tails light up, it works, if not, its busted
if your brake lights work, then you're more than likely right about the transmission control solenoid
The brake lights work. I got in touch with NAPA and they have te solenoid in stock...but there are two and he doesn't know which one I'll need.
Before you go doing that have you takin' the cables off the shifter and see if you can do it manualy. I'm really thinking your shifter assy is bad. Seems like you are able to start the car fine, but just do that before really doing major. I will try to check out Dealerworld for you if I can find any info on that for you.
Well now that I'm readin' up on this I need to know if you have been only tryin' to move the shifter while the car is runing or not. If you would try to shift the car in the RUN position.
I've tried both with the car running and with it not running. Still nothing.
Also, the cables are still connected to the shift linkage on the tranny and there was no play on them. We didnt try to move them manually.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edited Thursday, July 20, 2006 8:17 PM
Yea you might want to pop off the cable (You only have one) and try to do it that way. Then you can see if its the shifter. Maybe if it is the shifter brake lockout you can just take it out like lenko showed us, but then you don't have ot hit the brake to take it out of gear, but I would still if you know what I mean.
it might help it might not but maybe take a look with the centre console out and look at the shifter... i once had a socket fall inbetween the E-brake brush part and it blocked the lever from moving into gear hey ya never know.
http://img86.imageshack.us/img86/4235/jim25ek.jpg
Pop off the center console and take off the brake lockout cable completely, then enjoy, do what you want with the shifter.
It sounds like the park brake interlock solenoid (on the cable that goes between the ignition lock and shifter cable) is stuck. Or you've got something lodged in the shifter mechanism.
Either way, pull the console and take a peek.
