1999 Breeze automatic transmission , limp mode, will not shift up, solved

Hi,

This newsgroup gave me the answer to my problem (thru
groups.google.com), and so "to help the next guy", I'm posting
a summary of what happened and how I fixed it.

The car is a 1999 Plymouth Breeze with 39000 miles on it. (Yeah,
it's an old lady's car).

The symptoms:
1. The "check engine light came on".
2. The transmission would "clunk on downshifting when stopping",
and would not shift up out of 2'nd gear. Known as "limp mode".

I bought a code scanner( Equus Innova 3100 ) and it pulled the codes:
Listed in the scrolling order:

P0733 Gear 3 Incorrect Ratio
P0715 Input/Turbine Speed Sensor Circuit Malfunction
P0700 (Pending) Transmission Control System Malfunction

So after going to www.groups.google.com and searching
for "chrysler transmission speed sensor",
I came upon a few old posts describing the problem.

The general advice is:
1. a high percentage of the transmission problems is either the output
speed sensor or the input speed sensor on the transmission.
2. if the odometer is working fine, it's the input sensor (since the
output sensor feeds the odometer ).

So I installed the $30 input sensor and things are working fine.

The old sensor seemed to have a bit of corrosion on 1 of it's
connector pins. I wonder if it's location predisposes it to some
sort of "bi-metallic contact corrosion". It's contacts appeared to be
a white metal, whereas the connector has copper.

Anyways, I've tried to include as many "appropriate search keywords"
in this post as I could, to help future backyard mechanics.

Thanks again.

 

Thanks Zentara. Your contribution is valuable. Is the transmission a 41TE? I
assume this would apply to my Cirrus.

Icky