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Swapped motor, now transmission won't engage Park

oldschoolpontiacs

oldschoolpontiacs

New member
So I've been swapping out the blown motor in my sisters '97 GTP. I've got it mostly buttoned up, just waiting on some vacuum lines then I can see if it runs. I was putting the wheels back on it and I noticed that they were turning pretty freely, which was odd since I thought it was in Park. I look inside and sure enough the lever is in Park. Then I remembered I'd messed with the linkage cable back before I pulled the motor out, I didn't realize what it was and I was going to take it apart at the junction in the middle of it to get it out of the way. Obviously I realized it wasn't coming apart and then what it was for, and I put it back together and moved on. So I played around with it trying to make the transmission go into Park, but I couldn't make it happen, so I reached down to physically move the lever on the transmission and it still wouldn't engage. It would sometimes sort of clunk like it wanted to but then it would seem like something slid out and it would turn freely again. Interestingly, both wheels turned and there was some small amount of resistance as opposed to any of the other gears. I didn't pull the transmission out, just the motor, and the only thing I did with the tranny was replace the filter and pan gasket. So what the heck did I do to this thing?!?
 


nothing, if you have both wheels in the air, they are still gonna turn in park. it locks the diff to the case, but the spiders still can move. try to set it on the ground and see if its in park
 
Did you try adjusting the cable? There is an adjuster on the firewall in the cable. I have never hear of someone not having to do that when changing to a new transmission.
 
Really? I've never had this happen before, but now that I think about it I rarely work on FWD. RWD the parking pawl locks the output shaft so there's no way the wheels will turn. That would explain why both wheels turn though, **** that's so simple I can't believe I didn't think of it. You guys are lifesavers, I'll get it off the jackstands and see what happens

I didn't swap the tranny, or even touch it except to replace the filter and pan gasket, but I did monkey with the adjuster unwittingly so I'll have to readjust it.
 
I guess I should have read more carefully. I thought you said you swapped tranny's.
 


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