Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Transaxle '96 Contour CD4E - Name This Part...

...cause it just fell out. Any idea what the heck this is? It fell out today coming home from lunch and I lost all fluid and movement. Thank God it died right at the end of my driveway so I just pushed it in. It came from the bottom of the trans, driver front.

I think it's important.

It's a check valve of some sort, and by the looks of the stem, the retainer came of. It's floating around somewhere in the tranny now I would think unless it too fell out and onto the road somewhere.

Sorry to say it, but I think you're screwed. I'm betting that the trans will have to be pulled to replace it.

A transmission engineer at Livonia Transmission got back with me quick. He called it an "Accumulator Spring". I think thats the technical name, but it's part of the "Intermediate and Overdrive Servo" from what I gather. It takes a special tool to install (must need to really compress that spring).

I just called a trans shop in Farmington Hills who said this quite common for the ring to rust and the groove to pit, and it just falls out. He said it should be less that $200. Hopefully he's right.

AAA is on their way to my house right now. Oh well, it could have been worse, my wife could have been driving and gotten stranded. Then I'd really hear it:)

It is the 2-4 servo piston. To repair this is quite simple.

Buy a jack with small tip. 20 dollars at Auto Zone. Purchase new snap ring from Ford for about 4 dollars. Purchase new cap from Ford for about 10 dollars.

Place jack under cap and jack into place into housing. be sure to coat with atx fluid. Continuing jacking until cap clears snap ring land. Place snap ring into place. Total Cost about 34 dollars. Will take you no more than 15 minutes.

Bob

This is the second one that I have seen, on these boards, that has done this!

Have you had any work done on the tranny recently? It might be possible, if that is the case, that they installed the snap ring upside down. This would be the only reason that I can think of that would allow this to "pop" out like this.

Good luck and I hope you did not damage anything when or after this happened.

Just a base guess would be the spring loaded servo that controls line pressure.

I went ahead and had the repair done at the trans shop. Total cost was $188.33. This included all four parts new at a cost of $98. The $90.33 was tax and labor.

Phillip, I have had no repair on the trans recently (or ever) and it's still running strong with 164K miles and there appears to be no damage. The shop did say I was smart not to keep trying to drive its by revving the engine. He said this would have burned up the clutch cause it dry of fluid. I'm faithful to keep the fluid changed. I'll keep my fingers crossed that it keeps me rolling!