About 3 weeks ago, I was driving on the freeway at 65mph with the cruise control on. Suddenly, the speedometer indicator dropped to zero but the truck seemed to be going the same speed with no other problems. When I reached the nearest exit and braked to slow, the speedometer indicator came back to the current speed. However, whenever I tried to set the cruise it would drop back to zero. The next day I took it to my local mechanic as the check engine light came on while driving home from my trip (about 20 miles). He hooked it up to the computer and said the speed sensor was bad. It took awhile to get the part but once installed the check engine light went out and the truck seemed fine. The next day I drove it on the highway to the nearest "big" town to buy groceries (about a 40 mile round trip). I was doing fine so went to set the cruise and the same thing happened all over again except this time the check engine light came on immediately. Since my mechanic said it would be fine to drive it with the light on, and since I was almost totally out of food, I kept going. About another 10 miles toward my store, the truck acted light it didn't want to shift gears. I pulled over, put the truck in park, shut off the engine and restarted the truck hoping the cruise would release and thiings would be fine. In fact, I did this a couple times with 3-4 miles inbetween. The further I drove the worse the shifting became - I think I was only driving in 2nd gear by the time I got to town. I immediately stopped at the Ford dealership. They ran a diagnostic and found the speed sensor to be working fine. After five hours, they said they "think" it's something in the wiring and had spent the time tracing the wires from the engine backward but needed at least another 2-3 hours to finish and, being Saturday, they were closing. They put the truck "back together" and said it was okay to drive it. I made a follow-up appointment for this coming Thursday. They expect at least another 4-5 hours of work. On the way home I had trouble getting it out of 1st and manually shifted down to 2nd just to get here. I drove on the back country roads with my emergency flashers going the whole way. Do you think they are on the right track? Is it safe to drive it back to the dealership (25 miles) in 2nd gear? What is happening to my transmission? Would I be better off paying to have the truck towed back (which is cheaper than a new transmission!)? I can't afford a new vehicle and I've already got a couple hundred sunk into this problem alone. ANY advice is VERY GREATFULLY APPRECIATED! -Cindy
Sep 5, 2010 at 10:49 AM